


Wielded by the Worthy

by Crazy_Cat_Lady



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom, Thor (Movies), Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Avengers - Freeform, F/M, Jotun Loki, M/M, Not Slavery but Uncomfortably Close, Odin is not an ass, Other, Slow Build, Thor is, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-02
Updated: 2017-12-19
Packaged: 2017-12-31 07:31:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 47,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1028954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crazy_Cat_Lady/pseuds/Crazy_Cat_Lady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Saved from certain death by the All-Father and raised to serve his household as bonded mage and advisor, Loki was grateful for his life and honored at the opportunity to serve, until he was gifted the the crown prince. </p><p> Thor was less than appreciative to receive his own mage.  What he really wanted was a hammer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Foundling

**Author's Note:**

> After winging the last story, I meant to write this out and edit it up all nice and neat before posting it, but as it turns out, I am too much of a procrastinator to write that way, so if this story is going to get written, I am going to have to start putting it out and let the fact that people are waiting for more inspire me to keep working on it, so here goes! 
> 
> Wish me luck and have patience, dear readers.
> 
> ~~~~~
> 
> This fic is an AU and not compliant with the cannon of any of the movies, comics or myths, but I have tried to stay true to the overall setup of the universe and characters. The idea of mages being under such strict control is an exaggeration of what I see as Asgard's and Odin's distrust for magic and especially magic in the hands of non-Aesir. This does not include 'women's magic' like healing, midwifery and domestic magic.
> 
> We will be a while getting to Loki/Steve, but it is going to happen, I swear. 
> 
> I love hearing from my readers! Tell me what you think, ask me anything you're curious about.

_ “Among the Ljósálfar ,  Vanir and the Aesir, woman’s magic is strong.  Unplanned pregnancies and malformed children are all but unknown in these societies.   _

_The dwarves place any undesired children among their clanless outcasts, along with their parents if they should refuse to give up the child. The clanless, sometimes called ‘undesirables’, provide rough if sufficient care for most to end up as the next generation those who provide the labor that is deemed beneath their high clan kin.  _

_ The Dark Elves of Svartalfheim embrace all their children, no matter the deformity, but most of the misbegotten die, victims of the cruelty that permeates their culture.   _

_On Muspelheim, no child is ever born unwished for or imperfect, as the body of a fire giantess will reject any such pregnancy and reabsorb the fetus. _

_Midgard, home of the most fertile race in all the Nine realms, has practiced a wide range of solutions for the problem of unwanted children, from infanticide to adoption.  _

_But perhaps the most intriguing custom involving undesired babes is practiced by the Jötnar.   _

_ Shaped by the harshness of their realm of endless winter, the Jötnar are a ruthlessly practical people in times of famine, and intolerant of weakness, and of differences that might be weaknesses, but they are not entirely without pity.  Thus, they give such children as they consider misborn, or out of season to the Altars of Fate. _

_ The Altars exist in every Jötun temple, from the meanest to the most grand.  Before laying the child on Fate’s Altar, the parents or their surrogate sacrifices a small animal there.  This death is thought to appease the spirits who would seek the life of the infant.  Then the babe is laid on the altar, along with the body of the sacrificed animal, and left there to meet whatever fortune finds it. _

_ Anyone may take up the child from Fate’s Altar, and childless Jötuns frequent the temples in hopes of finding a healthy child.  Svartalfar slavers take some, the luckiest of whom end up as fighting slaves, soldiers and bodyguards on distant worlds, with the less fortunate sold to brothels or to the black market that provides to mages who practice the darkest arts.  However, most of these unwanted infants are probably taken by Jotunheim’s many predators, since their temples doors are always open.” _

** Audun Reginson -  A Collected History of the Folk of the Nine Realms **

** **

~~~~~~~

 

**Prologue**

 

It was Huginn and Muninn who led Odin the child, whose weak, thin cries might have otherwise gone unheard by the king whose ears still rang with the aftermath of battle.  They perched on the frosted stone of the altar, pecking at the body of a snow hare that rested next to the feebly flailing Jotun infant.

Huginn cocked his head and greeted the All-Father with a raucous caw, before dipping to pluck out the hare’s eye.  Odin’s own now-empty socket throbbed in sympathy, but he made no move to drive the birds away.  His ravens were magical beasts, Thought and Memory, but they were ravens still, and carrion was their due.  A hare was likely the least objectionable meal they might find, with a battlefield strewn with corpses of both Aesir and Jotnar in every direction around this temple.  At least it was not the body of the child they fed on, though it looked as if the infant could not live much longer, wrapped only in a thin wool blanket that had become soaked through with the rabbit’s blood.

A barbaric practice, from a barbaric race, Odin thought.  Truly, these Jotnar are little better than beasts.  It was surely the right thing to take their Casket and prevent them from inflicting death and suffering on a weaker race, though he knew well enough that the Midgardians were no less barbaric, even to their own children.

Though the babe was undersized for a giant’s offspring, it seemed to Odin no smaller than his own son had been, when the midwife had presented Thor to him.  Of course, Thor had not been blue, crimson-eyed and barely moving.  He had been red and squalling vigorously, his arms and legs swinging as if he could not wait to be put down, so he could start running and jumping and swinging a sword.

Compelled by some instinct, Odin put out his calloused, gore-streaked hand to touch the infant’s, who gripped it with surprising strength.  There was a sudden pulse of magic, and Odin almost drew away in surprise, but instead he kept still, waiting to see what would happen.  The infant’s crying ceased, and its tiny face worked, its fingers moving for a surer grip.  Where their flesh met, the blue cerulean chill began to slowly recede, replaced by a pink tint.

A born mage, the All-Father marveled, lifting the babe up for a better look.  Only the Jotnar would be so ignorant and foolish as to throw such a child away, simply because he was small.

Now cradled in the king’s arms, the child’s change accelerated, but before the rosy hue absorbed the blue and the raised lineage markings, Odin recognized with a start the markings of the royal bloodline.  Laufey’s get, and a bastard, but still undoubtedly his own.

Now fully Aesir in appearance, and in gender, the boy blinked up at Odin with vivid green eyes.  Odin felt blood flake off his cheeks as his face stretched in a smile.

The Casket of Ancient Winters might be Jotunheim’s greatest treasure, but it was not a tool that Odin could ever use.  This child, though, might turn out to be of great value.  

Drawing his cloak forward to cover the boy, he called his ravens to his shoulders and strode out to rejoin his army, renewed vigor in his stride.

** **


	2. Name Day Presents

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Odin's plans for Thor's name day present.

The air of Frigga’s garden was warm and sweetly scented with blooming flowers and herbs, and the shaded alcove was a peaceful refuge, with only enough trees to provide shade and a musical rustle of leaves, but not enough to conceal anyone who might attempt to do harm or overhear intimate conversations. Privacy was something rare for the king and queen of Asgard, outside of their bedchambers, and Frigga was savoring it, along with the herb tea and sweets that covered the table between them. 

She was aware that something was troubling him, and she hoped she would be able to aid him, but for the moment it was so pleasant to sit together in a sunlit garden and talk about the food and the weather, and other trivial things, like an ordinary married couple. 

“So,” Odin paused to sip his honeyed tea before inquiring, “How are your students coming along?”

It seemed an innocuous question, but the shift in her husband’s tone and sharpened gaze alerted Frigga that the small talk had come to an end, and the king was ready to discuss whatever matter had prompted him to request this private lunch. 

“Very well, thank you.” She set down her fork and folded her hands in her lap, wondering what this could possibly be about. “Why do you ask, husband?”

As Asgard’s queen, she oversaw the training of all the high born children who served in the royal court as pages and cupbearers, and later as squires and courtiers and ladies in waiting, but her personal students were the young mages who were being considered for service in the palace, or the household of some other important lord or allied ruler. Frigga considered it one of her most fulfilling tasks.

“I was hoping to give Thor his own mage for his coming name day,” Odin replied.

“What?” This was unexpected. “Do you think he’s really ready for such responsibility?” Frigga asked, smoothing her hands over the linen napkin still in her lap. She loved her son, but Thor was still years from his majority, and still very much a boy in many ways. Control of a bound mage was a serious matter, and her two students were also younger than the age typical for being gifted to a lord.

“No,” Odin answered, seriously. “But he needs to learn. I thought, someone closer to his own age might appeal to him more than an older mage.”

“Perhaps.” If the reports she’d had from Thor’s tutors and weapons trainers was anything to go by, her son wasn’t especially likely to listen to anyone older who was meant to advise him. 

Still... “You know Thor is expecting you to give him Mjölnir for his name day.”

“I told him he would have Mjölnir when he was ready,” Odin glowered, though not at her. “He is not ready.”

“But you think he is ready to control someone else’s magic?” Frigga replied, archly.

“A mage is not a hammer. A mage can refuse if Thor commands him to do something foolish,” Odin pointed out.

This was true. The collar could not compel a mage to perform magic, only prevent them from doing it without permission, but Frigga knew how persuasive her son could be, and how temperamental.

“Her, you mean. Since both my students are girls.”

“Her, then,” he corrected himself with a grumble, pushing his now empty plate and cup aside to lean forward across the table towards her. “Though I did think, maybe Loki would be preferable as a boy.”

“Amora is older,” Frigga pointed out, irked. “Either way, a girl might be a civilizing influence on Thor’s behavior.”

“Possibly, but do we want to run the risk of romantic entanglements? You know Thor must make a marriage alliance for the good of the realm,” Odin pointed out. 

“You have never had cause to complain of being wed to a mage,” she sniffed.

“Frigga...” he sighed gustily, a frown of guilt passing briefly over his features. “You know it isn’t the same situation.”

She scowled back at him, then let it go with a shake of her head. Things were the way they were, and she and Odin loved each other now, if they had not in the beginning, but it never failed to rankle her, just a little, that if her father had not been the king of Vanaheim, she would now be just another collared mage, not a queen. 

“Fine,” she answered. “It might become a problem, but it might not. What about that girl, Sif? You aren’t concerned about her?”

“I am,” Odin confessed. “But so far she seems more interested in swords than in kisses, and Thor would not easily be parted from her. Adding a second girl to their company might incite rivalry between them. Besides, Loki grew up as a boy,” he pointed out.

“Yes, I know.”

Frigga was unsure why the issue of gender was bothering her. Loki was a natural shapeshifter, and had taken on the race and single sex of the Vanir, having been raised on that world by foster parents. She didn’t know if his being male had carried over from the transformation he had made in Odin’s care as an infant, or if his caretakers had preferred a son to a daughter, but as soon as he had come to Frigga, he had changed into a she, and she was one of the queen’s favorites. Maybe it was because she had no daughters of her own, and she would miss the girl’s company.

Odin studied her, stroking his beard. “Do you truly believe your older student would be a better choice?” 

Drawn out of her scattered musings, Frigga needed only a moment’s consideration to know that Amora would be a disaster as Thor’s nameday gift. The girl was far too ambitious, and too willing to use her feminine wiles to get her way.

“I am still not sure if giving Thor his own mage is a good idea,” she told her husband, “but if you are determined, Loki would be the better choice.”

“Good,” Odin declared, clearly decided on the matter. “Have the boy prepared, then.” He pushed back from the table and got to his feet.

“Why a mage?” Frigga also stood, needing to understand before she gave in on this. “I agree with you about the hammer, he’s not ready, but why this?”

“Thor spends all his time fighting and running off on adventures, in the company of fighters. He needs to learn to rule men who are not warriors as well, and a mage who might be of some use to him is not so likely to be left behind. Loki can also offer my son protection. The dark elves do not love us, and there are other sorcerers outside of Asgard's rule who may be in league with our enemies.”

Frigga knew it would do no good to argue the matter further, but Odin clearly saw her reluctance. Coming to her side, he leaned down to kiss her cheek and give her one of his rare smiles. 

“It will be well,” he assured her. 

While she was less confident, Frigga forced a smile in return, kissed him back and started making plans to prepare her student for his new life.


	3. Green-Eyed Monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki tries to get ready for Thor's name day feast, but is interrupted by Amora.

 

Staring into the full-length mirror, Loki turned this way and that, trying to get accustomed to the stranger that was his reflection.    The movements caused his new clothing, most of it made of black and green leather, to creak slightly.

As the crown prince’s mage, Loki had assumed he would be wearing the ornately decorated robes usually worn by court magicians, but the All-Mother had told him that if he was going to be spending time with the prince, he would probably need sturdier clothes.  She had gifted him with a whole new wardrobe.  Most of it was simple trousers and tunics, shirts and vests, but this outfit was real armor, if of a very light variety.  A fine mesh of steel was layered into the knee-length black coat, and metal plates and enchantments against blades and fire and other damage tingled against senses.

He had been allowed to keep a few of his simple robes, but his few gowns and skirts and small collection of jewelry had been taken away, along with the most of his raven hair.  It had reached the small of his back before, but now it did not even touch his shoulders.  It made him feel lighter, but he couldn’t help but be sorry.  People had often told him, when he was a she, that her hair was lovely.

It had been over a decade since he’d switched genders, and he was nearly grown now.  The body he’d changed back to felt much different than the skinny near-child he’d been when he’d arrived on Asgard, desperately homesick for his foster parents back on Vanaheim.  

It wasn’t as if he’d consciously changed for the queen, but with her other pupil and most of her companions being female, it had just seemed a more natural fit.  Maybe it would work that way once he was with Prince Thor, too.  Most of Thor’s friends were male, after all.  All except that girl, Sif, who was practically a boy.

_I’ll get used to it soon enough._   In the meantime, maybe he could come up with some spells to summon and dispel this armor, so he would have it when he needed it, and wear more comfortable clothes the rest of the time.  

He glanced longingly at the bookshelves, wishing he could get started on that tonight, but there was no time.  He was due at Thor’s name day feast in under an hour, which didn’t give him enough time to do anything except sweat and fret nervously.

Behind him, the door was flung open with such force that it struck the wall beside it, and Amora swept into the room.  Loki turned around as she stalked towards him, uncomfortable with having her at his back.

Her green eyes glittered with fury, and her golden hair was wild, as if she’d been pulling on it in her rage.  

From her death glare, Loki guessed that Frigga had finally gotten around to telling her other student what was happening, and that Amora was far from pleased.

“How dare you take the prince from me!” she spat, her hands curling into claws like a cat.  “I am older and more talented than you!  I should be Thor’s mage!”  


It was true that she was older than him, and even a bit older than Thor himself, but Loki didn’t think she was more talented.  She had a lot of natural ability, true, but she was lazy.  She only wanted to do the kind of magic that would impress people, or sway them to her will.  She wasn’t willing to put in the study and practice that would ground her in a wider range of magics.  Besides, Prince Thor’s mage was also meant to be his advisor in fields like politics, history and culture, and Amora had no interest at all in those things.

He didn’t say any of that, though.  Instead, he shrugged.  

“You should tell them you don’t want it,” Amora demanded, stepping closer.  Perfume wafted from her in a dizzying cloud of scent, making him move back before he realized he was giving ground.

“I can’t do that, Amora.  I owe the All-Father, for everything I am, for giving me a home and an education.  I can’t not do what he asks of me.”

“I’ve been with Frigga longer.  I earned this chance, Loki.  It should be me.  At least I’m pure Aesir, and not some mongrel like you.”

Anger flashed through him, but he struggled to keep his face bored and blank. 

Shapechanging wasn’t an Aesir or Vanir ability, so Loki could hardly pretend to be purely either, but since he could honestly claim he’d never known his parents, people were left to speculate what his actual heritage might be, behind his back.  

“It isn’t up to me, any more than it is you.  The king and queen decided Thor would do better with a mage who is male, like him, and it’s not our place to question their decision.”

She stamped her foot and flung back her hair.  “It isn’t right!  It isn’t like you’re really a boy!  You’re just some kind of freak!”

“Besides,” she continued, smoothing her silken bodice in a way that did distracting things to his unfamiliar male parts,  “I love Thor, and he is going to fall in love with me!  I am going to be his queen,” she declared.

“Really?  Good luck with that.” Loki couldn’t help but let sarcasm color his tone.  He moved to place a chair between them, hoping his condition wasn’t visible through the tight leather pants.  His fellow student wasn’t stupid about most things, but she was clearly a bit deranged if she dreamed of marrying Thor.

“The All-Mother is a mage,” Amora pointed out, snippily.

“The All-Mother was also of royal blood,” he drawled.  “Which you are not.”

“Neither are you,” she snarled nastily.

_Actually, I am.  Even if I’m a bastard._   

But that wasn’t something he could tell her, or anyone for that matter.  Laufey might have thrown him away, but that didn’t mean he would be pleased to know that his enemy, Odin, had taken him up.  Jottunheim was a defeated realm, much weakened, but even a weak king could hire assassins, and there were plenty of Laufey’s enemies here in Asgard who would not scruple to take out their enmity on any of Jotun blood.  

So Loki simply smiled, and shrugged.  “I’m not looking to marry our prince, only to serve him.”

Amora’s lovely face flushed with anger.  “You may be satisfied to be his little pet mage, but I am not wearing a collar for the rest of my life!  I’m going to be someone!" 

“You can always leave.”  Asgard’s laws only required that mages be bound in the realms they controlled, but there was no prohibition against leaving to be a free mage on some other world.  Many did, unwilling to accept having their powers always at the beck and call of an assigned guardian.

“I am going to be someone _here_ ,” Amora insisted.  “Asgard is my home.”

“Then you have to live with Asgard’s rules,” Loki shrugged again.

“Not if I’m queen,” she smirked.

It seemed pointless to continue arguing with her, and he had his body back under control, so Loki turned back to the mirror, picking up a hairbrush and a flask of oil that might succeed in putting his flyaway locks in some semblance of order.

“I need to finish getting ready,” he reminded her, cooly. 

“You’re not as clever as you think you are, Loki,” Amora hissed, before storming out.

“Neither are you,” he answered softly, though she was gone, and it wasn’t much of a comeback anyway.

It was time to leave for the feasting hall, and he was as ready as he was going to get, so he shoved Amora’s jealousy to the back of his mind to keep company with all his other worries, and strolled out into the hall, his new boots ringing a falsely confident cadence on the marble floor.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry to be so long in posting. I meant to write over the weekend, but instead I went to see 'The Dark World' twice, and reveled in fangirl heaven.
> 
> Kudos, comments and questions are all much longed for by the author!


	4. Surprise, Surprise!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor doesn't get what he wants for his nameday.

Raising his heavy tankard of dark Dwarven ale, Thor chugged it all in one long swallow, wiped the foam from his lips and grinned triumphantly before hurling the empty mug over his shoulder to crash on the floor. 

“Another!” he yelled with a belch that set his friends to laughing uproariously.  Even Sif smiled a little.  The buxom serving wench also smiled, but she looked to the All-Mother for permission first, before putting a new cup of ale in front of him.  _As if I were not nearly a man, and old enough to decide for myself how much I should drink at my own nameday feast._  

He drank this one all at once as well, but most of the pleasure had gone out of it.  He set the tankard down with a thunk and concentrated on the food instead, helping himself to all his favorite dishes and joining in the ribbing Fandral was giving Volstagg about trying to clear the whole feast table by himself. 

His spirits rose again as the last courses were finished and his father rose to speak, and it was time for Thor to receive his presents.  As a prince, he alway got dozens of gifts.  Most of them were from people he didn’t know, who wanted to curry or keep the favor of Asgard’s king.   

These gifts were often weapons, and this year was no different.  Graciously as he could, Thor accepted three fine swords of different designs and lengths, but all finely made and decorated with gold and platinum and rare gems.  He thanked the ambassador from Musphelheim for a gleaming set of flame-shaped daggers with dragonbone hilts, and politely admired the Dwarf king’s gift of a spiked mace of shining obsidian set in rudy gold, with fire gems along the handle.  Vanaheim’s viceroy had sent his daughter to present Thor with an elegant ash and silver bow that was more suited to hunting than war, but at least a great improvement over the silly lute they had sent last year. 

They were all gifts fit for a prince, of course, and Thor did his best to seem pleased, as he did with the gifts of fine clothing, a beautifully carved tafl set, a gilded saddle and matching bridle, and other frippery knickknacks that he cared nothing about.  He would give most of it away, of course.  There was only one gift he really wanted tonight, and it would be the last and best one given, from his father. 

It was all Thor could do to be patient, and stay in his seat of honor looking royal and stately, when he wanted to leap up and shout with exuberance.  Today, his father would at last acknowledge his prowess as a warrior and gift him with Mjölnir, which was the only weapon he had ever desired, since Odin had allowed him to try it.  

It was the most powerful weapon in Asgard, excepting perhaps the All-Father’s spear, Gungnir, and when Thor had used it to summon lightning, he had felt powerful enough to slay dragons, or wipe out whole armies of giants.  Mjölnir was a weapon that would allow him to show everyone his true mettle. 

After what seemed an eternity, the last of the guest gifts had been presented.  Thor rushed through his thanks more hurriedly than was strictly polite, but he felt he would explode if he had to sit her one more minute, being handed trinkets when all he cared about was his real present. 

A breathless hush fell as the All-Father rose at last to speak in that ringing, reverberating way that was not shouting, yet reached the far ends of the great hall and made him sound every inch a king.   

He began by graciously thanking his guests for joining him and his family in their celebration of Thor’s nameday, though Thor thought that was a bit wrong way round, since the guests had all been treated to free food and drink and entertainment.  He praised their generous gifts, as if Thor hadn’t already thanked everyone. Finally, at last, got around to saying how proud he was of his son, and how he was growing into a fine man who was certain to be a great king when the time came for him to take the throne. 

Pride and excitement swelled in Thor’s chest, expanding to fill his whole body till it felt as if sparks should be shooting from his fingertips.  In fact, sparks were shooting from his fingertips, he saw, as a glancing touch shocked Fandral nearly out of his chair.  The tablecloth was pinpricked with smoldering burn marks.  

His mother gave him a quelling look, then made a tiny gesture that banished the wisps of smoke and repaired the damage, or at least concealed it.  Thor smiled sheepishly.  No one else appeared to have noticed, since they were all busy listening to their king drone on and on about duty and responsibility and the conscientious use of power.  Thor did his best not to fidget, or start any more fires. 

At last, his father called Thor to come and stand by his side so he could receive his gift and his blessing in full sight of everyone.  

Thor managed to stride confidently, waving and smiling at his friends and well-wishers, and not rush up in unseemly haste.  He was a prince, after all, and should behave as one. 

When he came to stand before his father and king, Odin’s face was somber, maybe even a little worried, so Thor tamped down his grin to a more attentive, serious expression.  This seemed to be the correct move, because his father continued, “Thus I have seen fit to grant my son a great boon, in honor of his nameday.” 

Turning a little, Thor surreptitiously searched the room for a glimpse of whoever was bringing him Mjölnir, but the only person headed in their direction was a slim, dark-haired boy in black and green, and he wasn’t carrying anything as far as Thor could tell. 

The boy came to a stop before them, and Thor had a glimpse of a hesitant smile, high cheekbones and viridian eyes framed by long, dark lashes, before the stranger dropped to one knee, placed his fist over his heart and bowed his head in obeisance. 

“All-Father,” the boy greeted them. “My Prince.”  

Gazing down in mystification, Thor observed a shining band of starmetal encircling the boy’s neck, just visible between his hair and high coat collar.  A mage then.  Perhaps he was meant to summon Mjölnir in a flash of light, or some other showy fashion.   

His father’s voice rang out, “I hereby declare that from this day forth, Thor Odinsson shall have the guardianship of his own mage, Loki of Vanaheim.” 

_What?_   Thor looked from the kneeling boy to his father, uncomprehending.  His blood surged, roaring in his ears to nearly deafen him to the crowd’s applause.  This was not right.  He was supposed to get Mjölnir, not a mage!  What use was a mage in battle? 

Odin’s face had gone stern, his single eye fixing Thor with a wordless warning.  The air crackled around them in response to Thor’s anger at this betrayal, and the boy mage raised his head, apprehension on his fine, pale features. His lips parted as if he would speak, but instead he only lowered his gaze again, waiting. 

Thor ground his teeth, wanting to rage, wanting to argue, wanting to demand his father give him what he had promised, but a shred of sense held him back.  His father might tolerate argument when they were alone, but a show of what Odin would term ‘childish pique’ in front of this crowd of dignitaries was not something the All-Father could easily forgive. 

“Place your hand on Loki’s collar, and I will seal him to you,” Odin instructed, not even acknowledging Thor’s fury. 

Thor grasped the collar roughly, not caring that he nearly upset the boy’s balance.  Green eyes flashed anger back at him, as Loki was forced to brace himself on Thor’s forearm, or else be choked, but Thor was beyond caring.  He paid little heed to the ritual words of binding, or the feel of the metal turning uncomfortably warm, then unnaturally chilled under his fingers as the magic took hold.   

When the thwack of his father’s spear against the floor told him it was done, Thor drew his hand back, unsurprised to now see his own name inscribed on the mage’s previously blank collar.   

“This is a great trust, Thor,” his father’s voice was now for just the two of them, or perhaps the three of them, as the mage could hardly help but overhear.  “See that you use it wisely.” 

“Of course, Father.”  Thor could not quite manage thanks, though it would have been proper.   

Dismissed, Thor was halfway back to his chair before he realized that the mage was trailing at his heels.   

“Go back to your place,” he snapped, not caring that he was being rude.   What else was he supposed to do?  He wasn’t about to ask any of his friends to give up their seat for this stranger who had been foisted on him like all the other useless gifts, and he doubted his mother would approve if he ordered the boy to crouch by his feet like a faithful hound.  He stalked on, and the mage did not follow him. 

Although Thor’s friends knew that he had expected to get Mjölnir, they could not offer him sympathy here. It was plain in their faces, though, especially Sif’s.  His mother was looking disapproving, which he assumed had something to do with the mage, but Thor refused to meet her gaze.  He was forced to endue what seemed to be everyone’s congratulations and a lot of useless and contradictory advice on how to manage a mage before he could get away.   

Once they were out of the feasting hall and away from listening ears, Sif and the Warriors Three tried to console Thor, assuring him that Odin would keep his word and give the prized hammer to his son, maybe in only a year or two. Fandral offered to take him to a pleasure house, Volstagg invited him on a tavern trawl ‘to get good and drunk’, and Sif and Hogun nearly tempted him by promising they could find a truly epic brawl in the slums of Nidavellir, but he was just too furious. 

Leaving them all behind, Thor went to the training grounds, took up his favorite practice hammer, and destroyed every practice dummy, every archery target, every bench, weapons rack, work table and climbing wall, until he sat down, panting, in a field of rubble and splintered wood.


	5. Divine Neglect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki tries to get Thor's attention.

Standing alone outside the door to Prince Thor’s chambers, Loki did his best to appear cool and nonchalant, although he was inwardly seething.

After being bound into the prince’s service, Loki had been moved out of the student mage quarters, along with his meager belongings, into a luxurious suite in the same wing of the palace as Thor, to be closer at hand when needed, but that had been over a week ago, and he had not had more than a passing glance of his so-called guardian since that night.

He had tried to be patient, applying himself to his studies as best he could, but when no summons had come after three days, Loki had sent a polite message asking when he might make himself available.  When he got no reply, he had started haunting the corridors between their rooms, hoping to come across the prince in passing, without success.

Thor apparently did not spend much time in his rooms.  He rose before dawn, stayed out till all hours, and frequently didn’t come home at all.  The guards and servants Loki had asked said that Prince Thor was restless and adventurous and preferred fighting and hunting and carousing to staying home.  Almost all of them had sounded fairly approving about this rather cavalier lifestyle, instead of expressing any opinions that it might be preferable for their future king to spend more time at court, learning the lessons of ruling from his father.  When Loki had subtly insinuated this concern, the footman had only laughed and shrugged, with a breezy comment about young men and wild oats.

“Besides,” the man had added, “That’s what the Prince has you for.”

Except the prince didn’t, because he had either forgotten Loki, or was actively avoiding him, and now Loki had been reduced to lingering outside Thor’s door like an abandoned pet.  It was humiliating, though thankfully there were only a few of the lowest-ranked servants up and moving around the halls this early in the day.  

At long last, the door to Thor’s chambers opened, and Loki hurried to put himself in the prince’s path.  Thor halted, looking surprised, and maybe a little guilty.  

_For forgetting me? Or avoiding me?_   “My prince,” Loki saluted, taking a firm grip on decorum despite his annoyance.  “Forgive my forwardness.  I am eager to begin my new duties.”

“Oh.”  Thor shrugged.  “Well, I don’t really need any magic right now.  I’m just going to the training yards to spar.”

“This afternoon, perhaps?” Loki suggested.  “Your father will be holding court today, or would you be interested in attending the Council session? There are several important trade negotiations being discussed, and I would be happy to advise you on the facts and figures.”

Confusion and distaste warred on Thor’s face.  “I thought you were a mage?”

Loki stared back.  Could he really be that ignorant?  “I am, but I have also been studying history, trade and governance with your lady mother, since it is my duty to advise and assist you in those matters as well.  It is not expected that you would be needing magic as often as knowledge.”  _Oh, that didn’t sound pompous and conceited at all, did it?_

Or maybe it did.  Thor was scowling at him now.  “I’m going riding later, so I won’t be needing you at all today.”  

He made as if to walk past Loki, but the younger boy moved back to block him again.  “May I at least practice my magic, to be better able to serve his highness when he does need me?”

“Do what you like,” Thor replied, moving again to go around him.

_You know very well I can’t, you prick._   “My prince, I need your consent.”

“It’s fine!” Thor was looking impatient now.  “You have it.”

“You have to say the actual words!” Loki’s own temper flared hot.  Surely someone had explained this to Thor, and if not, the stupid oaf had been living around mages bound to Odin and other nobles his entire life.  It was common knowledge!  It was the whole reason for the collars.

“What words?” The prince’s face was flushed, and his fists were clenched.

Loki fought back the urge to shout.  “You have to give me permission to use magic.”  

Thor made no such effort.  “I gave it to you!”

“You have to say ‘You have my permission to use magic’!” Loki yelled back at him.  “That’s how the binding works!”  And he was now resenting it more than he ever had when it had been his foster parents, or his teachers, or Frigga who had held such power over him.

“Oh. Right.” Now Thor sounded sullen.  Still angry, but embarrassed as well.  “You have my permission to use magic,” he muttered.  “Is that all?”

“Yes,” Loki bit off, then more smoothly, “Thank you, my prince.”  Bowing, he stood aside.

“Fine.”  Thor took his leave without a backward glance.

~~~~~~

Back in his own room, Loki immediately conjured a handful of flame, letting it surge and shrink and flow around his spread fingers as he exerted his will.  Then he changed the fire to water, to ice, and finally to mist, as he allowed the familiar combination of concentration and delight soothe his jangling nerves.  

That had not gone at all as well he’d wanted.  Loki had intended to show the prince how useful he could be.  After all, he had been studying and practicing for over a century to serve as a mage in Odin’s service, but Thor had acted as if none of his skills were worthwhile.  _Ignorant brute._

Well, he would just have to try again.  Sighing, Loki moved before the mirror to practice illusions and disguises.  He could be a great help to Thor, he was certain, if only the prince would allow it.

Halfway through his exercises in wards, it came to Loki that Thor’s permission was far broader than what he was used to.  Usually his guardian had given him much more specific instructions on what powers he was to practice, but Thor had granted him full use.  Whatever he wanted.  

Abruptly cheered, Loki dispelled his wards and changed his shirt, trousers and boots for his more familiar robe and soft slippers.  Such attire would be less remarkable in the mages library, and there were entire shelves of books that he had only ever managed to sneak glimpses in before.  Now he was officially bound to a guardian, which granted him full mage status.  He could read anything he wanted, and today, at least, he had permission to try any magic he wished.  

Surely he could find something truly impressive to show his prince.

~~~~~~  

After a week spent mostly in the library, Loki was forced to hunt down Thor again to have his permission renewed.

His prince was drinking and telling tales with Sif, Volstagg and Fandral, and looked annoyed by Loki’s interruption. “But I already said-”

“You have to renew his permission every day, Thor,” Sif spoke before Loki could overcome his indignation at this new evidence that Thor cared nothing about him or his circumstances.

“Oh. Right,” Thor nodded, then looked over at Loki with a sigh.  “What a nuisance.”

Loki folded his arms so he would be less tempted to punch his keeper in the face.  “I apologize for the inconvenience, my prince,” he retorted, not able to keep the sarcasm from leaking into his voice.

But it only made Thor laugh and clap him on the back hard enough to stagger him.  “More for you than me, eh?  Isn’t there any way to get around that?  Make it so I can just tell you once a week or so?”

“No, your highness.  Renewing all permissions for working magics every day is your father’s own law.”  _And how can you possibly not know that?_

“Do you need to use magic every day?  You’ve only asked permission twice, nearly a week apart,” Thor pointed out.

“You are supposed to send for me.  I’m supposed to be serving you!”

Sif whacked her friend on the thigh with the flat of her sword.  “Thor, will you stop tormenting the boy and give him permission?” 

“Fine, fine.” Thor grinned and moved out of Sif’s range.  “You have my permission to use magic.  And if you’ll ask the servant who brings my breakfast to wake you and bring you with her, I’ll see that you have it every day that I’m in the palace, anyhow.”

This magnanimity would have been more pleasant if Thor had not managed to make it sound like it was another chore added to his day.  Loki’s face went hot, but he managed, “Thank you, my prince.”  

He sucked in a breath, then suggested, “Maybe you would like to see some of what I can do?”

“No need,” Thor waved him away. “I’ve seen Mother do magic plenty of times.”

“But-”

“I’ll see you in the morning, Loki,” Thor insisted.

_So he does know my name, after all_.  Loki stared into the prince’s brilliant blue eyes, seeing no acceptance, no willingness to budge.  Well, then, he would go.  He would go his own way, and show his power whether Thor wanted to see it or not.

Spinning off a scatter of light, Loki vanished into a concealment spell, then used an illusion of the closed doors and a muffling spell to go through them undetected.

Still invisible, he then ran all the way back to his room, flung himself onto his bed to stare up at the high, gilded ceiling and unwillingly leak out a few tears of anger and frustration that the person who was supposed to be most important in his life from now on didn’t find him worth even a few minutes of his time. 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki comes up with a plan to earn Thor's respect.

Months passed, and Loki’s life as Thor’s mage settled into a routine. Thor continued to spend a great deal of time away from Asgard on hunts, or on adventures with his friends, but whenever he was in residence, a servant would pause on his way to deliver the prince’s breakfast to knock on Loki’s door, and the mage would follow along, be granted permission to use his magic, after which he was dismissed to do as he wished. Thor never put any limitations on his magic, or asked any questions about how he spent his time, and Loki stopped trying to get his interest after a few more attempts.

Most days he spent either in the library, or his own chambers, reading or practicing magic, but he also began to venture out into the city and surrounding countryside, exploring the shops, museums and other sights. As his forays grew more wide-ranging, he learned to ride, and practiced shifting into a bird or war hound, or any other shape he thought might prove useful. 

Once or twice, when he was certain of his privacy, he changed back into his female form, but it was no comfort, since he knew he would not be allowed to take that shape again and rejoin the Queen’s handmaidens. He was less sure if he would be allowed to resume studying magic with the All-Mother, but if he did, Amora would know how little Thor wanted him, and he wasn’t up to facing that. 

Often, he was gone until dark. He knew he wasn’t supposed to be wandering this way without asking. He was supposed to be on hand to attend Thor at any time, but after the first few long excursions, something in him rebelled, and he had stopped telling anyone where he might be found. If he was ever missed, he could be severely punished, or even be dismissed from the prince’s service. 

Loki didn’t want to lose his place, exactly, but it would be worth a punishment, even a flogging, if only Thor should ever somehow see his company as something desirable, rather than merely tolerable for the few official functions they were required to attend.

It was during one of his trips that inspiration struck. He had gone to the forested reserve that was a half a day’s ride from the city, looking to gather some rare herbs and other ingredients, both for healing and magic, and also try his hand at a spell he had found in a very old tome in the palace library that would supposedly allow him to speak the language of beasts. 

The gigantic, ill-tempered boar that he surprised in a berry patch didn’t seem inclined to listen, however. Neither did his horse, which bolted and left him alone, facing the monster in full charge.

He hurled a fireball at it, which blinded it momentarily, which allowed him time to climb a tree. More fire seemed to only make it angry and more determined to slice him to ribbons and trample him flat, and the tree he had chosen was not tall, or sturdy, and it shook and swayed alarmingly at the boar's repeated impacts. Loki clung tenaciously to the topmost branches and tried to think of something. 

He knew dozens of spells that would roast the beast, or freeze it, or turn it inside out, or to its own weight in mice. He knew that he knew them, but with his feet scrabbling for purchase and his hands tearing with the effort to cling to the rough bark and his heart hammering its way out of his chest, he couldn’t think of a single one.

When his foot slipped, he fell not quite to the ground, near enough to kick the boar between it’s beady, malevolent eyes. Try as he might, he could not find a branch in reach to pull himself back up. In desperation, he let himself fall to one side of the tree as the boar went to the other. There was no time to get up, much less run. Loki vanished himself, and as the boar made to charge again, cast an illusion of himself several yards away.

The clone dissolved into green sparks as the boar hurtled through it, shaking its massive head from side to side in an attempt to gore and rip with its tusks. Loki cast another illusion, further away, and the boar went for that one too.

By this time, Loki had picked himself up and drawn his pathetically small pruning knife, trying to decide whether to run or climb a better tree, but as the enraged creature plunged through the second clone and struck a tree with sufficient force to stun it, he had the idea.

When he thought about it later, he knew it for a really stupid idea, but at the time it had seemed brilliant.

Summoning the ice that was his blood heritage, Loki shaped a long, sharp lance, complete with crossbar, veiled it, and made a third copy of himself right where the boar would be sure to see it as it picked itself up, dazed but angrier than ever.

It charged. The Loki clone ran, leading the monster in a wide circle to let it build up speed and come upon Loki’s spear at the perfect angle. The illusion shredded away and the impact hurled Loki back, his heels skidding in the deep layers of fallen leaves until his back struck a grandfather oak and held him in place as the boar churned and jerked and snorted its way up the spear, straining to reach him even as the life bled out of it. He willed the spear to widen, growing thicker and heavier, larger and longer, until the boar shuddered and collapsed, dragging him down with it.

When he was sure it was not getting back up, Loki let go of the spear and sat up, brushing the worst of dirt and leaves from his hair and clothes, trying to catch his breath. He was shaking, bruised, filthy, and exhilarated. It had tried to kill him, and he had killed it instead. Was this how Thor felt? Loki could suddenly see the appeal.

Perhaps the next time Thor went out hunting, or looking for a fight, Loki would go along. Just as soon as he showed Thor how useful he could be.

~~~~~~~

Sif was the first one to spot Loki, when he approached the sparring ring where Thor was fighting against both Hogun and Fandral. She raised her brows inquiringly to see him dressed in his light armor, which he had not worn since the night he’d been sealed to Thor.

Volstagg turned to follow her gaze, lowering a heavy mug to call him over. “Loki!” he boomed, with apparent good cheer. The heavyset warrior was sweating and covered with sweat. 

“Come and join us! Have you come to lend us a hand against Thor?”

“If the prince will allow it,” Loki agreed, settling down beside the two to watch.

“You’ll have to wait your turn, though,” Sif said. “I’m next.”

“Just you?” In the ring, Thor had sent Fandral flying into one of the bales of straw lining the stone walls of the barracks, and was matching Hogun blow for blow, hammer against mace. The prince was grinning, and the other warrior’s stoic expression revealed nothing.

“I’m not a fragile maid,” Sif retorted, scowling.

“I never meant to imply you were,” Loki denied. Sif had a reputation as a skilled fighter, he knew, and since there were few other women warriors, her opponents likely all were larger and stronger than her. 

He attempted a compliment. “It’s clever of you to go last, when he’s tired from fighting the others.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You don’t think I can take Thor in a fair fight? Because I can.”

“Why would you want to?” Loki asked, confused at what ‘fair’ had to do with fighting. Who wouldn’t want to take every advantage they could find when someone was trying to bash their head in?

Volstagg guffawed heartily, but Sif’s fists were clenched and her eyes burned into him.

“I apologize, Lady Sif,” Loki did his best to sound contrite, even if he had no idea what he had said to offend her.

Suddenly, Thor leaped up out of the ring to loom over them both. “What is this? Sif, you look as if you mean to murder my mage. What has the poor boy done, suggest a certain style of gown? Admire your golden hair?”

“He thinks I deliberately waited till you were tired to fight you,” Sif ground out.

Thor laughed, his eyes alight at Loki’s discomfiture. “Not so, I assure you. Sif is usually last because if she beats me, I am frequently unfit to fight for the rest of the day, and thus get less practice!”

“Ah.” Loki replied, feeling altogether out of place here. What had made him think he could somehow join them? It was a stupid idea.

Thor was studying him curiously now. “What brings you out here, and in such attire? Is there some event I have lost track of? A review of troops or such?”

“No, my prince,” Loki assured him. “I thought- It’s just-” 

“Has Sif’s beauty tangled your smooth tongue, Loki?” Fandral mocked, limping up with Hogun right behind him.

“Shut up, you ass,” Sif’s reply was more automatic than heated.

Fat Volstagg unexpectedly came to his rescue. “He said he wanted to train with us.”

Thor looked nonplussed. “Mages don’t fight.”

“Yes, they do,” Loki protested. “In a war, there are lots of spells-”

“Yes, yes,” Thor brushed this aside with a wave of his hand. “I mean real fighting, up close, with weapons, not underhanded tricks.”

Stung, Loki crossed his arms. “Do you know how to defend against those ‘underhanded tricks’, then?”

Sif and the three male warriors seemed intrigued, but Thor merely shrugged. “A true warrior will prevail easily over such machinations.”

Loki lifted his chin. “Oh, really? Why don’t we step into the ring and find out?”

Thor was opening his mouth to answer when Sif cut him off. “Let me, my prince. After all, you are already tired from your previous bouts.” 

Her sharp smile was all challenge when she addressed Loki. “You don’t mind fighting a woman, do you?”

“If you don’t mind fighting a mage.”

“Not a bit.” She took up a wickedly sharp glaive and spun it briefly into a blurring wheel, then used it to gesture towards the sand-filled sparring ring. “After you.”

As it turned out, Sif was astonishingly quick. She and Loki circled each other a few times, until he made the first move by simply vanishing. Even unseen and unheard, he could not get close to her. She spun and whirled, weaving a storm of steel around herself that he did not dare approach.

Reappearing, he threw fireballs. None would do more than singe if they should connect, but none did. Sif dodged and laughed and beckoned him to engage. 

Stooping, Loki covered the ground with a sheet of slippery ice, and Sif grew more cautious and wary of her movements. Loki vanished again, then reappeared along with three copies of himself, all forming a loose circle around the shield maiden. They began to close in as she made short jabs to ward them off.

“How can you defend yourself if you don’t know which enemy to strike?” he taunted, all of his clones speaking with him in unison.

“Like this!” The careful jab in his direction turned into a full strike, though thankfully Sif had turned the glaive around so that it was the pole that impacted his face, not the blade.

Loki crumpled, his hands flying to his throbbing face where a warm gush of liquid told him his nose was bleeding. His illusions had, of course, vanished when his concentration was broken.

“Good fighting, Sif!” Thor called his praise as he and his friends came down into the ring. Coming to Loki’s side, Thor extended his hand. Loki took it and let his guardian pull him to his feet.

“Are you badly hurt?” he asked.

Shaking his head, Loki used a quick healing spell to staunch the bleeding and reduce the swelling. 

“You see, true warriors have naught to fear from mages,” Thor chuckled, indulgently. “But you did not do too badly.”

“You’ve got good balance, and quick reflexes,” Fandral told him, offering a wet cloth so Loki could wipe his face.

After cleaning off the worst of the blood, Loki asked a smug Sif, “How did you know it was me?”

“You flinched,” she explained. “Your illusions didn’t.”

“Oh.” Loki winced. “I’ll work on that.”

Unexpectedly, Hogun spoke up. “You can do healing spells?”

“Basic ones,” Loki nodded once, touching his still-painful face. “Not as well as Eir and her helpers, of course.”

“But healing is a woman’s art,” Thor protested.

“For the Aesir. It is not so for the Vanir.” Or the Jotnar, either, it seemed.

“Useful,” Hogun grunted.

“Saves trips to the healing rooms,” Volstagg approved.

Thor glanced around at his friends, then gave Loki a wide smile. “Well then, if you are interested in learning, we’ll see what we can do about making a decent fighter out of you.”

Loki smiled back, uncertainly. It was not quite what he’d had in mind, but once he had the prince’s approval, he could do a better job persuading Thor to attend to his royal duties.

Clapping him on the shoulder, Thor exclaimed, “First, we’ll see what we can do about training you to use a real weapon.”


	7. Chapter 7

From that day forward, Loki joined Thor and his companions during their sessions in the practice ring as often as he could. Sometimes he would try out new spells, but at Thor’s insistence, most of his time was spent learning to fight with ‘real weapons’. Despite innumerable injuries ranging from bruises to broken bones, Loki found it more enjoyable than he would have guessed, and he could not help but be pleased to find himself gaining speed and strength, and cunning.

It took some weeks for them to settle on Loki’s best weapons. Fandral tried him on swords. Though Loki did not want to dedicate decades of his life learning to make a longsword or rapier an extension of his arm, he did learn footwork and to parry a blade. Volstagg taught him how to dodge and how to best absorb any blow that couldn’t be dodged, and Hogun taught him how to block and how to throw an opponent, and how to fall, which turned out to be much more important. 

Neither bothered to teach him more than a few basic moves with the axe or mace, and they dissuaded Thor from trying to sell him on the hammer, declaring that Loki did not have the sheer muscle to ever be proficient with them. More than a few swings left him tired out with his adversary too close. 

Sif wound up his primary instructor, agreeing that Loki was better off keeping some distance from an enemy. She taught him the staff and spear, and daggers, both to throw and as a weapon of last resort.

What he mainly learned from Thor was how to not drop whatever weapon he was holding and run away when charged by a musclebound, bloodthirsty loon with a hammer, but when he began accompanying them on their adventures, he soon saw that although he had little patience with instructing, or skill at explaining, the prince was an incredibly gifted fighter. 

This was fortunate, in Loki’s opinion, because Thor was also headstrong, reckless and eager to find opportunities to show his skills off.

Still, just when Loki had started to like him, Thor reminded him what an ungrateful lout he could be. After all, who but an ingrate and a moron wouldn’t be grateful that someone had prevented a rock troll from crushing him like a bug?

They had been sent to investigate reports of trolls raiding isolated farmsteads in the mountains. Reports had proven true enough, but rather than report back to the king and send out part of the army to deal with the problem, or even collect extra troops at the nearest town, Thor had decided the five of them should simply go up into the mountains, find the trolls(however many they might be) and eliminate them. Which was how they had found themselves facing three at once, and Thor would have had his thick head bashed in, if not for Loki.

“I did not need any help,” Thor repeated, even more sullenly than the first time. “And it was not honorable for you to turn the club to sand like that.”

“It was sawdust, not sand,” Loki corrected irritably, “And it was a troll three times your size, not a challenger in the holmgang.”

“Let it go, Thor,” Fandral urged, joining the group by the fire and accepting a bowl of stew and a loaf of bread from Volstagg.

Sif didn’t look up from the map she was studying, but she did add a “Please,” to the argument.

Thor paid no attention. “It is the principle of the thing.”

“Fine, my prince,” Loki folded his arms. “If we find any more trolls tomorrow, I will be sure not to help you.”

“You can help, just not with magic.”

“Very well,” Loki frowned. “I will let the twenty-foot trolls with impenetrable skin keep their weapons if that’s what you want.”

“And no blinding them with bursts of light,” Thor added, unreasonably. “Or freezing the ground so they slip and fall.”

Incredulous, Loki demanded, “Just what is it you expect me to do? Poke them with a spear? Try to get them in the eyes with a dagger?” 

“You are supposed to use your magic the way I tell you to,” Thor reminded him, completely dodging the issue at hand.

“I do,” Loki shot back. “What about all those stupid pranks I pulled for you in the council meetings and at court?” Allowing Thor to suggest juvenile tricks for Loki to play on pompous or long-winded council members had been highly useful in getting him to attend more often, and even stay awake throughout the proceedings.

“I thought you liked doing that!” Now Thor had the nerve to act betrayed, like Loki had been trying to trick him.

“That’s not the point!” Loki yanked at his hair, trying to calm down. He had made so much progress with Thor, and he didn’t want to go back to being ignored or avoided back in Asgard.

Volstagg paused in his eating to be conciliatory. “I thought your putting the birds in Snorri’s beard was pretty funny.” 

“That was inspired,” Fandral agreed, grinning. “Everyone kept looking around for where the chirping was coming from.”

“It was a good trick,” Thor smirked. “But not as funny as when you made the dwarven ambassador see the walnuts on the council table as gems.”

“True,” Loki admitted, remembering how the dwarf had collected handfuls of the nuts and stuffed them into his pockets, and looked pained every time any other guest had reached for the bowl. It had taken some very tricky illusions to cause only him to see the diamonds and rubies and sapphires, and keep him from seeing that the other guests were eating their prizes, not hoarding them.

“So can we talk about something else yet?” Sif asked, hopefully. “Thor, be reasonable. Magic is still Loki’s best weapon.”

“Fine,” Thor conceded, massaging the scattering of fine hairs on his chin that he insisted was a beard. “But only in self-defense. Or to protect Sif, or the others.”

Aghast, Loki said, “You can’t ask me not to protect you, my prince.”

Thor went back to scowling. “I can protect myself just fine!”

At Sif’s warning look, Loki managed to swallow another protest. “As you say.”

Thor brightened, as he always did when he was getting his way. “Good. I do not mean to be harsh with you, Loki. I suppose you cannot help your womanish worrying, since you are no true man.”

“Thor!” Sif cried, appalled.

Loki blinked in shock. Thor’s words were deathly insult among the Aesir warriors. He was neither Aesir or warrior, and he had no idea how he should respond.

Thor flushed, and hurried on, “I only meant, Amora told me that you are really a girl, and that they made you into a boy to serve me.”

Thor’s friends all started asking questions at once, but Loki registered none of it. He had put his jealous fellow student out of his mind, hoping she would be assigned out of Asgard, or find some other, more realistic ambition than becoming Thor’s queen, but it seemed she was still around and still looking to cause trouble.

“You should take care not to listen to everything Amora says,” Loki replied, feeling weak and shaken.

“It is not so that you studied with my mother as a girl?” Thor asked, confused.

“I- yes..” He couldn’t exactly lie; it would be easy enough for Thor to find out if he asked around a bit, but Loki had had the impression that since Thor’s parents had not told him, that the prince was not meant to know, just as he wasn’t meant to know about Loki’s true identity until Odin thought he was ready.

Thor nodded, relieved. “So you can’t help it, I suppose. Though I don’t understand why father would change you into a boy. I would not have minded your being a girl.”

“I wouldn’t have either,” Fandral smiled. “I am always glad of feminine company.”

“The All-Father can do that?” Volstagg asked, pulling out a cask of mead and pouring himself a tankard, which he downed and refilled before pouring for the rest of them. “I have never heard of such a thing.”

“No. I mean, I don’t know if he can or not,” Loki took the drink gratefully. “But he didn’t. He just asked me to change. I grew up as a boy, on Vanaheim.”

“I don’t understand,” Sif said, slowly.

“I am a shape changer. You’ve seen me turn into a bird, and other things,” Loki reminded them.

“Yes, but-”

“So are you really a boy, or a girl?” Fandral wanted to know. Of course Fandral would.

Both. Neither. Loki shook his head. “I am whichever I am. I’m male now. I’m just as much a man as you are, my prince.”

Thor looked dubious. “I do not understand. My mother did not urge you to... be female, to study with her?”

“No. It just seemed easier.” The queen had not even questioned it at the time. So far from his foster parents and everyone he’d known, it had been simple to become an entirely different person. He’d thought it would be that easy to change again, for Thor. It seemed not.

“Why would you choose to do such a thing?” It was in Thor’s almost-disgusted face that he was on the verge of making another ‘no true man’ statement.

“Can we talk about this some other time?” Loki asked, somewhat desperately. He wanted to talk to Frigga and find out what he was supposed to say. Why hadn’t someone warned him what he was supposed to do in this situation? It was stupid to think Thor wouldn’t find out, even if he was oblivious of so many things.

“Can you change any time you want?" Fandral was clearly transfixed with the idea. “Can we see you as a girl? A woman, I mean?” he corrected when Sif kicked his ankle.

Loki held out his mug for Volstagg to refill. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“I too would be curious to see,” Thor said.

At some point, Sif had risen to her feet, but now she sat down beside Loki and took his hand. “He doesn’t need to change if he doesn’t want to, Thor. Leave him alone.”

Thor turned stubborn, as he was wont to do. “He did not mind changing into a bird.”

“Well,” she considered, then squeezed Loki’s hand before responding, “You don’t have a lot of wrongheaded ideas about birds.”

“It was the All-Father’s wish that I be a boy... a man,” Loki stammered. “I think I should abide by his wishes.”

“Sounds wise to me,” Volstagg approved.

Fandral made a disappointed moan.

“Good,” Sif said. She glanced out the entrance to the cave into the dark. “Thor, do you want to take over the watch from Hogun, or should I?”

“I will,” Thor said, exchanging his now-empty tankard for his hammer and getting to his feet.

“The rest of us should get some sleep,” Sif suggested firmly. “We still have a lot of ground to cover tomorrow, and who knows how many more trolls.”

But the subject could not be dropped until Hogun, returned from his guard post outside, had been filled in by Volstagg and Fandral while he listened silently, eating his stew and washing it down with mead.

“Doesn’t matter to me,” he told Loki, in his usual laconic manner.

Loki thought he meant it. But Hogun was the only one. Amora had meant to cause trouble, and she had succeeded. He lay awake a long time, wondering how much hard won respect he had lost with the prince, and whether he would ever be able to get it back.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amora discovers an unexpected ally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rewritten with new scene!
> 
> ~~~~~

~~~~~~~

 

For once, Frigga had no helpful advice to give. She was sympathetic, but left it entirely up to Loki how to solve the problem of his gender with Thor.

“The two of you are meant to be together for a very long time,” the queen reminded him. “I wish Thor had been more mature about it, but the two of you will have to figure it out yourselves.”

“He keeps asking to see, though, and I don’t know if I should.”

“You should do what you feel is right, Loki.” Frigga’s compassionate tone was a bit peevish when she continued, “I was against forcing you to change for this position to begin with.”

“I assumed the All-Father had a good reason,” Loki queried, hopeful that it would be a reason that Thor would accept.

Thor’s mother shrugged very slightly. “Odin was concerned that Thor might develop inappropriate romantic feelings.”

“I see.” Loki found that unlikely; he hadn’t seen any evidence that Thor was really all that interested in women, or at least no more than he was interested in ale or food.

“I will speak to him about his rudeness,” Frigga offered.

That would probably just make Thor resentful. “That’s all right, your Majesty,” he made himself smile reassuringly. “The prince and I can get this sorted out on our own.”

Getting to his feet, he bowed. “I am sorry to have bothered you.”

She rose as well, worry in her lovely blue eyes. “It’s no bother, Loki. Please don’t hesitate to come see me, and not only if you need something. I have missed your company.”

“And I yours, my queen,” he replied, truthfully. “Thank you.”

Thus he left feeling a little better, if with still no clue how to deal with Thor.

~~~~~

 

Laying the single strand of blond hair she had managed to filch from Thor’s cloak in the polished silver basin, Amora slowly poured from her ewer, filling it with pure water. The hair swirled and danced in the flow, then settled, barely visible, as the water stilled into the mirror smoothness required for scrying. Then, careful not to let her breath ripple the surface, she leaned over and gazed not into the water, but into her vision, seeking her Prince.

The image of Thor, laughing, virile and golden as he practiced in the training ring with his friend Hogun, was as clear and solid as if she were gazing out a window, though it did not allow her to hear what jests the two warriors were exchanging to cause them to grin so. 

Scrying was one of Amora’s best skills, though she had to pretend to barely be able to manage it at all, just to get Frigga to allow her permission to practice it. Otherwise she would be spending all her time rehearsing tasks like healing and midwifery and protection spells, and other things more suited to a servant than Asgard’s future queen. 

Worse, she wasn’t even allowed to learn magic that would be really useful. The one time she’d even hinted at hoping to study it, the All-Mother had proclaimed mind magic ‘dark magic’ and ‘strictly forbidden’, so beyond a few sneaked peeks at books she wasn’t supposed to see, Amora had been denied all access to the kind of magic she knew she would be best at: making people do what she wanted.

Once she mastered that, she would make Thor see how much he could love her. She would make everyone love her, and the king would remove her collar and let her marry Thor and become Asgard’s greatest queen ever. Such magic would make her ever so useful to Thor! She would force all his enemies to surrender, and all his nobles to obey him without question, and she would free all the mages and teach the Aesir to respect magic as it deserved. 

If only she could work out some way of getting around the damned collar, or at least Frigga’s suspicious nature. The woman was probably just jealous because Amora was still young and beautiful. Otherwise it made no sense that she wouldn’t want her son to marry a sorceress, or promote the status of mages.

It would be easier to coax a male guardian to be more open-minded about her studies, she was certain, but the only openings for bonded mages available for the next few years were on boring, backwater estates, and she didn’t want to be sent away from the palace, where she could occasionally happen into Thor. She had been careful to become inept at certain lessons after Loki’s being assigned to the prince, so she could stay longer. 

If only the king had let her serve as Thor’s mage in the first place, she would not have to endure such tedious studies or the humiliating necessity of pretending not to be able to understand them. It had not escaped her notice that Loki was now allowed to study whatever he wanted.

Her delicate sniff of indignation at this injustice disturbed the water, causing the scene to ripple and then slowly change point of view, as if she were a bird who had flown to a new perch, watching the same proceedings from a new perspective. This view was wider, including more of Thor’s surroundings, and clearly showed Sif, Fandral, Volstag and Loki sitting in the stands, watching the opponents spar.

That was where she should be, she thought, irritated. Well, not there, exactly, because it looked rather hot and dull, except for getting to see Thor. But she should be at his side, and then they would both be somewhere much more comfortable and interesting, like a party, with all the richest and most important people of the realms, or on a tour to see the wonders of the different worlds, and be hosted by their kings and nobles. 

Loki wasn’t any good to Thor at all. In fact, he was a potential embarrassment to the prince and all of Asgard! Amora had tried to tell Thor about the so-called boy's freakish nature, changing from female to male as he had, but the only result of that was Loki’s complaining to Frigga, who had then lectured Amora about the importance of discretion. As if Amora didn’t know how to keep a secret.

If only there were some way of making everyone see how unfit Loki was, and how much more perfect she was for Thor! 

Frowning, she watched the tiny figures in her bowl move about as Thor took a seat with the Warriors Three and Loki and Sif entered the ring. Unnatural, both of them! 

The water rippled again, though she had done nothing to disturb it this time. The bright surface darkened, erasing the scene and forming a writhing, coiling mass from which seven pairs of glowing eyes now burned. 

Amora felt the power of this being, the sense of unimaginable age and terrible grandeur. She grasped the bowl with both hands, meaning to fling it away, spill the water and break the connection this entity was seeking to establish, but before she could do so, the voice spoke, sevenfold and hissing, the words slithering into her ears, her mind, her very soul. 

“Sssso you desssire power, little sssorceresss? I can grant you all that you wisssh.”

Lowering her hands to the table, Amora leaned in closer to listen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~~~~
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks to ladymouse2 and tilla123 for nudging me back to this story! Them that asks, sometimes gets, so never hesitate to ask. ^_^


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to the Snowpocalypse, I had a little extra time to write. I hope you enjoy! If you do, I hope you'll let me know!

~~~~~~~

Loki went to Sif next, but she was just as at a loss for solutions.

“I love Thor dearly” she said, as the two of them commiserated over a cup of wine in Sif’s chambers, “But sometimes he can be such an idiot.”

“I just don’t want him to treat me differently,” Loki lamented. “I mean, what difference does it make, anyway?”

“Believe me, I know,” Sif agreed, nodding a bit drunkenly. “Would you mind, I’d love to see you as a woman. I mean, you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

Sif was actually blushing, Loki saw. Of course, it might be the effects of the wine. It seemed to be a much stronger vintage than its delicate flavor had indicated.

“All right. Just between us,” he warned, then let his form shift to female.

“Oh,” Sif’s eyes went wide with surprise. “You don’t look all that different,” she said, as her gaze wandered over his changed face and body. “Your face is a little softer, and your shoulders aren’t as broad. It’s hard to tell much about the rest of you, in that robe.”

Hesitant, but curious of her opinion, Loki unfastened the thick brocade robe and stood up, wobbling slightly she tugged it over her head and let it fall, leaving her in only the loincloth which had become too tight around the hips and too loose in other areas. She tugged it up into a more comfortable position.

“All right, now you look very different!” Sif laughed.

Loki felt her cheeks go hot, and covered her small breasts with her arms.

“Sorry, sorry,” Sif hurriedly apologized, seeing Loki’s embarrassment. “Don’t worry, Loki. It’s not like I don’t have them too.” She stood up and started undoing the fastenings of her breastplate.

“Sif!” Loki cried, her face now burning.

“What? It’s nothing you haven’t seen in the mirror.”

“Yes, but I have to change back, and then I won’t be able to unsee them!”

Sif paused her disrobing, staring at Loki. “You never look at my breasts.”

Loki bit her lip and said nothing. Loudly.

“Really? I’ve never seen you!”

“Just because I don’t ogle doesn’t mean I don’t look.”

“But you showed me yours!”

“You asked!”

“Not to see your tits!”

Loki grabbed her robe and yanked it back on, frowning.

“Not that they aren’t cute.” Sif’s eyes twinkled with suppressed merriment. “Sure you don’t want to see mine? It hardly seems fair.”

“If you catch me leering later it will be your own faullt.”

“Being male really does make you stupider about that?” Sif inquired sweetly.

“I suppose so. I can’t help but look at Amora’s chest, and I hate her with a passion.”

Sif refilled their cups and petted her hand. “I’ll try not to give you grief about it, then.”

“Thank you.” Slouching down in the chair, Loki turned back to his male form. “I still don’t know what to do about Thor.”

Sif’s expression was fascinated as she observed the transformation. “I don’t know either, but I sure wish I could do that.”

“I’m beginning to wish I’d never done it at all,” Loki grumbled.

“I don’t suppose there’s any way you could change me?”

“What?” Loki straightened. “Why?”

Getting up, Sif began to pace as she talked. “You’ve seen the yearly contests, haven’t you?”

“Some of them.”

Every midsummer, Asgard held a festival and games, and gave out prizes for the winners of dozens of contests in everything from baking to battle skills. Until he had been assigned to Thor, Loki had not been terribly interested in the fighting, preferring to attend the competitions of artisans and scholars. He had been disappointed to find that no prizes were given in magic, but the healing and fertility magics native to the Aesir weren’t skills that lent themselves to contests.

“Women aren’t permitted to compete with men in the combat trials,” Sif paused to toss her head derisively. “I’ve won the women’s bouts six years running. I know I could beat most of the men, too, if they’d just let me try.”

“That doesn’t seem fair,” Loki agreed, muzzily taking another swallow of wine. “Scared to fight you, I bet.”

“I know,” Sif nodded. “But if I could be a man...”

“No,” Loki waved his cup at her, then put it cautiously down when it threatened to spill, “No, that would be proving them right, and we don’t want to do that,” he corrected. “You want to win as a woman.”

“But they won’t let me!”

“No, see, you don’t want to be a man,” Loki told her. “You just need to look like one.”

“Can you do that? You can do that, can’t you?” Sif brightened.

“Of course. It’ll be tricky, though. I might not be able to keep up an illusion for that long, though. I’ll have to make a glamor you can put on. It’ll work better with some physical help, though.” Loki got up and steadied himself by taking Sif by the shoulders. “You’ll need to look more like a man, and less like you. How do you feel about cutting and darkening your hair?”

~~~~~~

Loki solved the issue of his gender with Thor by refusing to change for him, citing the king’s wishes, and appealing to the prince to instruct him on how to behave ‘as a man should.’ After that, the issue was shelved.

Sif wound up taking third place in the men’s midsummer tournament that year, and was thrilled at her success. Loki was smug that his magic had worked so well. They were they only two people happy about it, it seemed.

Thor was genuinely happy for Sif, since he had always stood up for her right be treated as any other warrior, and had never failed to proclaim to anyone who would listen that she was one of the best. However, the deception had angered many of the male warriors, who felt Sif had cheated, possibly with the aid of magic. These warriors had complained to the All-Father, and Odin had sternly lectured Thor about keeping a firmer hand on his bonded mage. Thor had passed on the annoyance to Loki.

“From now on, you have to ask me before you do anything like that,” Thor directed. “Father blamed me, and I had no idea about any of it!”

“Forgive me, Thor,” Loki lowered his head. “I did not think, and I should have been more circumspect.”

“Well,” Thor looked mollified by this show of contrition, “It was right that she got to prove her skills. Next year they’ll have to let her compete, or they’ll look like cowards,” he declared, grinning. “So I guess underhanded methods are well enough in a good cause.”

“Thank you, my prince,” Loki smiled back, relieved.

“But you have to fix Sif’s hair. Her father is beside himself, saying you’ve ruined her looks.”

The smile wilted a little, and Loki reluctantly admitted, “I tried earlier. I’m not sure why it didn’t work. I’ll keep working on it,” he promised. Loki had an idea that Sif might not want it to change back, if her father was that worried about her appearance, after she had shown everyone her skill as a fighter in the ring.

“Oh. Well, I’m sure you’ll get it figured out soon,” Thor shrugged.

“Maybe until then, I can get her one of those gold wigs that the rich dwarf women wear,” Loki suggested, smiling slyly.

Bellowing with laughter, Thor thumped him on the back, jarring Loki nearly off his feet. “You should! I would love to see that!”

“You know she’d never wear it, though.”

“I know, I know,” Thor wheezed out a final laugh and wiped away tears of mirth. “Anyway, I’ve have a better idea for your tricks than Sif’s hair.”

“Yes?” Loki came alert. Thor had never asked him for magic of any kind before.

“Do you suppose you could learn some way of traveling without using the Bifrost, like the elves are said to do?” Thor asked.

“Not exactly, but maybe something similar.” There had to have been some way of travel between realms before the Bifrost, or they could never have built it in the first place. “Why?”

“What about some way to conceal us all from Heimdall, for at least a little while?” Thor pleaded.

“Thor, what is it you want to do?” Loki demanded.

“I want to surprise my father, by getting something for him,” Thor said, enthusiastic. “Besides, it’s somewhere you can’t go by Bifrost.”

“Where is that?” Loki knew that the Bifrost was never opened in cities or anywhere else inhabited, but it could usually be aimed very close by, within at least a day’s walk or less.

“On Midgard, but under its sea. A place called ‘Atlantis’. They have an artifact called the Serpent Crown. If I could bring that to Father, I know he would see I am ready to have Mjölnir,” Thor expanded, excitedly.

This all sounded highly dubious to Loki, but looking into Thor’s happy, hopeful face, it was impossible to say anything except, “I’ll see what I can do.”


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is much later than I had planned, but it was troublesome.

Loki applied himself to the problem of travel first, careful to phrase his inquires to the senior mages as a means of getting Thor and his friends out of danger in an emergency, rather than something they, or he, might ever do secretly. 

They had not seemed interested, preferring to explain to Loki that the Bifrost was by far a safer and more reliable means of travel than lost arts that had depended on the strength and skill of the mage. 

He had tried to point out that the Bifrost could not be opened inside caves or dwellings or in a crowded city, which his former teachers had to admit was so, but it soon became obvious that they could not conceive of the kind of fixes that their prince and his companions were capable of getting into, and thus were unable to think of a situation where such chancy means of travel might be necessary.

He decided to ask Frigga, assuming she was more familiar with her son’s exploits and recklessness, and might be willing to tutor Loki in alternate means of getting him out of risky situations.

“Almost no one learns those methods since Asgard’s conquest of Vaniheim,” she told him, regretfully. “It’s true that the Bifrost is a better means of travel, most of the time.”

“Is it forbidden to travel by other means? Loki asked.

“No, but it is hazardous.” She eyed him thoughtfully. “Is there a reason for all these questions, Loki?”

Not wanting to lie to Frigga, Loki edited the truth a little instead. “It’s just that the Bifrost is limited to places that are outside and it’s not supposed to be opened in a city. Last season when we were hunting down those trolls, we had to fight some of them deep inside a cave. If someone had gotten badly hurt, we would have had to carry them all the way out before we could call the Bifrost. In an emergency, the extra time could be crucial.”

The queen paled at the thought. Maybe she hadn’t been aware of the kind of hazards Thor was facing. “That is true,” she admitted, slowly pacing in a circle around her bower. “Still, the Bifrost is a safe means of travel. The old methods could be very dangerous. Mages often disappeared.”

“Do you know them? The old ways?” Loki asked, hopefully.

“I learned them as a girl,” she acknowledged, “but I have not had cause to use them in ages, nor taught any of my students.”

“I would be very careful,” Loki promised. “You know I would.”

When she continued to hesitate, Loki tried a different angle. “Even if I never need to use it, Vahaheim’s traditional magic shouldn’t be lost. Some of the younger mages should learn it, shouldn’t we?”

Frigga straightened, a determined glint taking the place of doubt in her lovely blue eyes and Loki knew he had reached her. For all that she was Odin’s wife and Asgard’s queen, she still harbored a seed of resentment over the conquest of her people, and the suppression and harnessing of Vanir magics.

“You are right,” she nodded, flashing him a little smile. “It shouldn’t be forgotten. All knowledge is important.”

Then she sobered. “But you must give me your word that you will use the utmost caution.”

“I swear, All-Mother,” Loki caught up her hand and kissed the back of it, holding back a giddy grin. “I won’t do anything foolish.”

“Hmm.” She pursed her lips at him while he tried not to bounce with excitement.

“Very well,” she said at last. “Meet me at sun height three days from now at the top of Ymir’s spire, and I will teach you to sky walk.”

~~~~~

“We will begin with very short jumps,” Frigga told him, once he had joined her on the wide sill of a tower window.

It was a very long way down. Gripping the nearby wall for support, Loki wondered if he could make the transformation to bird in time if he should slip.

As she clasped his free hand, the queen gave him a smile that he couldn’t help think of as mischievous. “It is best to do this from somewhere high up. My old tutor called it ‘falling with style’.”

She pointed her chin at the nearby, but still alarmingly far down palace roof. “We’re going to my patio garden, there. Do you see it?”

He looked. It took a moment to find the small oasis of greenery tucked into the glare of gold. “I see it.”

“To sky walk, you must always be able to see your destination. It is the same principle that the Bifrost uses, which is why the Observatory must be used to operate it.”

“Does that mean no one can operate the Bifrost except Heimdall?” Loki asked, startled at the thought.

“No one else could do it as well.” Frigga smiled approval at his guess. “Others can use the Observatory to see, with practice, but no one can see as well or as far as the Gatekeeper.”

“Oh.” That was very interesting, but a lesson for another day. Frigga was drawing on her power, imbuing the air around them with swirling blue light.

“Always begin by creating a cushion of air. This is to soften your landing, and also keep insects out of your teeth.” 

Loki couldn’t quite tell if she was joking, from her slight smirk. A light wind ruffled their hair and tugged at their clothes, and Loki could see Frigga’s will inscribing a globe around them with runes for safety, protection, and resilience.

“Be ready to stop, before you start,” she advised, adding spell writing for ‘slow’, and ’cease’. “If you lose your concentration, your landing could be quite painful.”

With that final bit of advice, she squeezed his hand, threw up runes of speed and direction, and they were both falling, flying with terrifying velocity. Loki could see how one could very easily lose their concentration, though he barely had time to complete the thought before his feet were planted on the ground. 

Looking down, he saw that the protection spells had inscribed a circle of glowing marks around them on the ground that slowly faded out. “Just like the Bifrost!”

“Correct,” Frigga said, combing back her now wind-tossed hair with her fingers and smiling in what looked like exhilaration, but she was also pale and she wobbled slightly as she took three steps and collapsed onto a nearby gold and marble bench.

Concerned, Loki hurried to join her. “Are you all right, my lady?”

“Just a bit tired,” she told him, patting his hand. “This is one of the dangers of sky walking. If you try to travel too far this way, you may drain yourself. If you use up all your reserve and cannot hold the landing spells, you might be killed, or severely injured. Even if you do land safely, if you have used up all your strength, you would be helpless. 

“So when you are ready to practice, you are going to keep to level ground, and very gradually increase your distances until you have learned your limit.”

“Of course,” Loki promised, seeing the sense in this. He glanced up at the window they had started from. It seemed very far up. “But it can be used to go both up and down?”

“King Cearnos, my great, great grandfather, decided to impress all the realms by having his palace float through the skies of Vanaheim, high above his people. This method of travel was developed to get there and back.”

“I’ve never heard that. Was the castle destroyed in the war with Asgard?” Loki asked, a little diffidently. 

“Oh no,” Frigga laughed. “It still exists, though it no longer flies. Cearnos’s son, Caletheon, decided that a floating castle was too impractical, and had it landed. The rest of the royal palace was built around it.”

Loki had grown up in that castle, fostered by King Vili’s royal mage and her husband, the king’s chamberlain. “I didn’t know that. I think I would have liked to have lived in a flying castle.”

“I thought so too, growing up,” Frigga laughed. “But enough about that. Let’s see you cast your landing and protection spells.”

Loki called up his magic and settled into the familiar role of student.

 

~~~~~

It took three weeks and some very bumpy landings before Frigga would let him try making the jump from the tower window alone. When he landed perfectly (except for crushing a bed of phlox and verbena) he could hardly wait to show Thor.

Thor was less impressed than Loki would have liked.

“I suppose it might be of some use,” the prince grudgingly conceded, after Loki had transported him from the middle of the training ring to the roof of the nearby guard barrack. “If we needed to get up a cliff, or some such thing.”

Seeing Loki’s crestfallen face as they came back to the ring, Fandral spoke up, “It could be really helpful getting out of a tight spot, although it could use some speeding up. If we were being chased, say by someone’s angry father and his men, it would be better if you didn’t have to stop and build the glowing sphere thing.”

“If I am present, we will not be running away,” Thor declared. “We would stand and fight.”

Sif, who had been watching the show from her seat at ringside, sniffed, “If you seduce some lord’s daughter while I’m anywhere around, they won’t need to chase you, because I’ll be sitting on you until they are finished kicking your ass.”

“You are so unkind!” Fandral protested, wounded. “I don’t seduce women. Can I help it if they are constantly flinging themselves into my path?”

“Might be good for escaping fire,” Hogun suggested, without looking up from the blade he was sharpening.

“Or dragons breathing fire,” Volstagg added, around a mouthful of roasted boar. “Since Thor has had his heart set on fighting one, if we should ever find one.”

Dragons had once been inhabitants of many worlds, but had long since become naught but rumors throughout most of the Nine realms. There were still plenty of dragons in Muspelheim, Loki knew. He decided never to mention it.

“Can you do it more quickly, though?” Sif asked Loki, seeming interested. “It really could be useful in an emergency.”

Brightening, Loki promised he would see what he could do.

 

~~~~~

After much practice, Loki was able to generate his spells on the run and in the space of two breaths, and despite Thor’s continued grumbling about ‘cowardly magic’, they were soon incorporating short sky walks into combat drill.

It worked splendidly to escape a charging opponent, and Loki could make a series of small jumps without tiring, but adding passengers was much more taxing, draining his magic rapidly. He had managed a single attempt at jumping all five of them the short distance up to the same roof he’d taken Thor, but passed out promptly after.

He’d woken up in his own bed, feeling worn thin and unable to do more magic than create a spark or film of ice for the next whole day.

 

~~~~~

 

Almost two months had gone by, and Loki was starting to hope Thor had either forgotten the idea of going to the undersea kingdom on Midgard, or else come to the same conclusion as Loki, which was that it was not a good idea. His hopes were in vain. 

A few weeks before Thor’s next name day, Loki entered the prince’s room as usual, to get his permission to use magic for the day. 

“Loki,” Thor greeted him without his usual animation, but dismissed his page and started picking at his breakfast. “Have you made any progress finding us a way to get to Atlan-“

“To that place you were telling me about some time back?” Loki quickly cut him off, raising his eyebrows sharply and attempting to convey ‘Heimdal may be watching.’ “Where they have that unusual item you thought your father would be interested in having?”

Scowling, either at being interrupted or at his own carelessness, Thor flicked a berry across the room where it vanished into his rumpled bedclothes. Just a little extra work for the servants, not that they ever complained.

“Yes. That place with the thing. Have you figured out how we are going to get it?”

“Not yet,” Loki sighed. “Thor, I’ve been researching this place, and I’m not sure it can be done. It is not just under Midgard’s ocean, it is very deep beneath them. Even if we discover some means of getting there, there is the matter of intense pressure, and how to breathe underwater.”

“You’re clever,” Thor said, pushing his food aside. “You’ll figure it out.”

“Even if I can find some way, are you sure this is even a good idea?”

“Of course it is! It is just the thing to prove to father that I am ready to have Mjölnir.”

“I still think you’d be more likely to impress the king by attending more Council meetings and other court functions.”

“I will have to do all that when I am king,” Thor groaned at the prospect. “Anyway, it makes sense that it should be something that requires your help. That’s why father gave you to me, to let me prove that I could be responsible with your magic.”

“You think this plan would prove you were being responsible?”

“It’s to safeguard the realms, just as my father and his father before him,” Thor pointed out. “Father has a vault filled with relics he has collected to keep them from being misused.”

 

“Like what?” Loki hadn’t heard of it, though he supposed it would be a closely kept secret, if it were so.

“There is the Eternal Flame, that powers Sutar’s sword, taken from the Muspelheim by father and his brothers, and the Infinity Gauntlet, though the gems are all scattered, and of course the Casket of Ancient Winters, from Jotunheim. Some kind of scrying orb. This eye thing- it’s really unnerving, always looking at you. A few other odds and ends.”

Thor was walking about his room, putting on his boots and bits of armor and pretending to be casual about the whole thing, but he kept looking back to see if his mage was impressed. Maybe Loki wasn’t showing the proper awe, because he added, “Some of the really impressive things are hidden in other places, secret even from me, at least till I take the crown. My grandfather, King Bor, took the Aether from the Dark Elves, to keep them from destroying the whole universe. And my father has the Tesseract hidden somewhere.”

“Oh.” That Asgard had taken the Casket was no secret. Loki had been told about the war, and about how it had been necessary to take the powerful artifact to prevent the Jotnar from using it to wreak war and destruction with it. He just hadn’t realized that the Aesir had long been making a habit of doing such things. He’d had a vague notion that many of Vanahim’s most potent magics had been taken to Asgard after the conquest, but he’d never given it much thought.

“So you see, if I get the Serpent Crown for father, to prevent it being misused, he’ll have to see that I really wish to protect the realms, and you are helping me, but that if I also had Mjölnir, I could do even more.”

“I suppose that makes sense.” Loki had only met Odin a few times, in very brief and formal encounters. Thor was his son; he must know the king’s mind better than Loki could.

It was an unsettling thought. Restlessly, he touched the metal that encircled his throat, brushing a finger over the letters of Thor’s name, wondering if he was merely another of those stolen relics. 

“So you’ll do it?” Thor’s face lit up.

“I already promised I would try,” Loki pointed out, “But like I told you, it just might not be possible.”

Thor clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll think of something, and when we all return triumphant, I shall have Mjölnir, and we will all be remembered in song throughout the ages!”

“I think I would be satisfied if we managed to do it at all, without getting killed,” Loki griped, halfheartedly, but the idea of heroic song had plucked at an elusive strand of memory. 

“If you’ll excuse me, my prince, I will go and make a start on finding a way to do the impossible for you.”

“Of course,” Thor walked with him to the door. “Come and meet us for practice in the afternoon and tell me what you’ve learned.”

“I will do that,” Loki agreed, departing at a fast walk, his mind already cataloging the books and scrolls where he would begin his search.

 

~~~~~

 

“Did you find an answer in your dusty books?” Thor inquired, as Loki joined him and the Warriors Three in the baths after practice. 

Sif had gone off to the women's bath. She was never especially modest when it was just the six of them, away from Asgard, but here she had to make concessions to the court’s wagging tongues.

“I may have a lead, at least,” Loki answered, leaning back gratefully into the steaming water and letting it ease the ache of sore muscles and new bruises. “It was what you said about songs that gave me the idea, Thor.”

This caused Thor to pause in his scrubbing. “How so?” 

“Remember the lay of Gilli Geirrodson and the Lindworm of Nykvaag?” Loki prompted. It was not one of the more popular tales, but it was not so obscure that Loki had not heard it more than once sung in the feast halls.

“Is that the one with the virgin-eating dragon and the hero who marries her after he slays the beast?” Fandral asked, wiping water from his face with a towel.

From his sprawl on a nearby bench, Volstagg asked, “Aren’t all the tales with dragons about that?” 

“Just tell us what you found out,” Thor directed.

“There is a stanza about Gilli using something called a ‘wayfarer’s stone’ to get to the land of the dead and find the enchanted spear…” Loki reminded them.

“I think I know the song you mean,” Volstagg rumbled, then began to sing the chorus, which was about bold Gilli the fearless and his heart that was true.

“Right, yes,” Loki hurried to try and cut the portly warrior off. The song had nearly a hundred verses. “Anyway, I wasn’t able to find any references to a ‘wayfarer’s stone’ in any of the books in the library, but they have something in the artifacts room called a ‘traveller’s compass’.” 

“A compass is a pretty typical item for travelers,” Fandral put in. 

“Only it isn’t a compass, in the usual sense,” Loki argued. “It’s a gem. A sapphire cut with twelve facets on its face, like a compass.”

“Could just be a pretty stone,” Hogun spoke up.

“It might,” Loki conceded, “But then why would it be in the mages library?”

Thor asked, “What is it you think it does?”

“I hope,” Loki stressed the word ‘hope’, because it was a bit of a wild gamble, based on an old heroic song, “That it is a tool used for locating natural portals between the realms.”

“So when can we try it out?” Thor wanted to know.

Loki was seized with a sudden spasm of anxiety. Of course Thor would want to be there when Loki tried it out, but from what he had read about the naturally occurring portals, there was no way to tell where they led without going through one. It was exceedingly dangerous, as it could land the traveler anywhere: in a Musphelheim lava plain, or an airless moon. As a shapeshifter, Loki was uniquely qualified to make the first jumps, alone, to make sure it would be safe.

He hedged, “I’ll let you know, once I get it, and find out if it works. It may take a little while.” 

Thor looked a little disappointed that they would have to wait, but seemed to accept it. Conversation soon turned to other matters, mostly concerning Volstagg’s upcoming wedding. Loki smiled and teased their fat friend along with the others, but most of his thoughts were on how to accomplish his upcoming task, and how not to get caught.

 

~~~~~

 

Before he set out to ‘borrow’ the traveller’s compass, Loki cast every spell of invisibility, concealment and ‘notice-me-not’ that he had been able to find. It made him nervous not to know what Heimdall could and could not see. He replaced the sapphire with a piece of blue glass spelled to resemble it, though considering the thin layer of dust on the display case, its being missing might never have been noticed.

He could tell from examining it that it required a spell to activate, but there was none to be found anywhere he checked. It would take most of his long lifetime to search through all the books in the mages library, and there was no guarantee that the spell had simply not been lost ages ago, so by trial and error, Loki recreated it, using a book of known rifts that had all been sealed up after the Bifrost had come online. 

The sapphire worked by invoking the spell, and watching which facet lit up for a direction to follow. Once Loki was reasonably certain it was working properly, he set out to search the outermost fringes of Asgard, reasoning if there were any portals that had not previously been found and sealed, they would be in some out of the way place.

Three weeks after beginning his search, in a valley of the Gautsdalr mountains, the gem led him into a fissure between two boulders that opened up into a narrow cave. He was still following the flash of light on the surface, when, without warning, he fell into another world.

Stunned by the sudden change, Loki picked himself up from the snow, blinking against a blast of icy wind, and gazed around at a dim and wintery world. There was no sign of life, nothing to see anywhere except snowy hills, and bright stars overhead.

He had never seen those stars, but he had studied them, just as he had studied the constellations of all nine realms, and he knew where he was. He was on his birth world. He had found a portal into Jotunheim.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am back to working on both my in-progress fics. I have decided that the next one to be updated will be determined by which one has more increased kudos and comments when I sit down to write next. You may note that the other story has a big head start, which may seem unfair, but what the hey, it would be more fair just to alternate, so if you guys want your next chapter before them, you just have to get out the vote. 
> 
> Huge thanks to tilla123 for beta reading this chapter for me! Many annoying errors caught.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Congratulations to you, readers! Despite my other fic having a big head start, your enthusiasm in giving kudos and comments for this story has earned you an update first! 
> 
> I hope you enjoy it!
> 
>  
> 
> ~~~~

Loki’s first thought was to get back to Asgard as quickly as possible, but could not tell which direction to turn to go back through the portal without the travelers’s compass, which he had dropped as he fell. He might be able to just try walking a few steps in every direction, but he didn’t want to go back without the stone.

After another careful look around, he knelt and rummaged through the snow, careful to keep his eyes and ears open for any sign of a snow cat or dire wolves creeping up on him. His fingers grew so numb from the cold that he considered shape shifting to his original skin, but he was still holding his spells of concealment, and changing form would use up magic that might be better held in reserve. A few minutes of cold would not hurt him, and he didn’t have any plans to be here longer than that.

At last he found it, and grinned with triumph despite his chattering teeth. He had actually found a portal, and survived passing through it, and landed on a world he knew he would never have been allowed to travel to by Bifrost. Now he just needed to get back without being seen.

He cleaned the snow off the sapphire with his tunic, and settled it as level as he could manage in the palm of his hand. Instead of the light flaring from a single facet to indicate direction, it was shining brilliantly from the center, and more dimly from the south and the northwest. Confused, Loki put his other hand above it, in case it was reflecting light from some other source, but the readings stayed the same.

Slowly, he walked a few paces towards the south, and the flare shifted from the center to the north most facet, but the southern and northwestern faces continued to glimmer softly. As he circled around the patch of disturbed snow, the light continued to move around the face of the gem, always pointing him back to his landing site, but with those fainter gleams keeping to the south and northwest. His only explanation for that was that there must be other portals within the gems range, but try as he might, he could not find the portal he needed. Whenever he walked back to his starting point, the center space flared bright, seeming to indicate he was right on top of it, but all he could see was trampled snow.

Panic was just beginning to pluck at his nerves when he finally thought to turn the gem sideways, and blew out a sigh of relief to see the directional light move upward.

The portal was up. Of course it was up. He had fallen through it, hadn’t he? It had only seemed a short fall, too quick to even separate in his mind from the crossing, so it couldn’t be too far above him.

Setting the stone down on a clean patch of snow, Loki shifted into a magpie, walked to it and grasped it firmly in his long, clawed toes, and leapt into the air, beating up hard against the biting wind. 

Five wingbeats up, the open night sky turned to a close, dark cave, and he had to back wing and turn sharply to avoid hitting the ceiling. Veering towards the light, he flew out of the cave, back into the blazing gold of Asgard’s sun. 

He was strongly tempted to just fly the distance back to where Thor and the others had set up camp, but a deep pocket was more secure than a bird’s talon, so he landed on a flat boulder, set the gem down and changed back to his usual form. 

It would have been more convenient if he could have pocketed it before shifting, since all his clothes and other possessions had been keyed to change with him, but without that addition, inherently magical or spelled items could interact oddly with the magic of the transformation, and not everything could be adapted. Loki had once lost a valuable pocket scrying mirror that way; it had changed into a nasty lump of metal, skin and fur during a shift to and from bear form.

That didn’t mean he had to carry it loose, though, he decided, putting it into a coat pocket and buttoning it up. He would affix it to a chain, once he had tested that metal did not interfere with the stone’s function.

He collected his staff from where he had left it beside the narrow cave entrance, and set out walking back. 

 

~~~~~

 

When Loki returned to camp, he found Thor and his companions in high spirits, but also very sweaty, dirty and sporting a variety of minor injuries. They had gone off to explore on their own and stumbled upon a herd of bilgesnipe, which would have been dangerous enough even had it not been the beginning of the mating season, and all the males in rut and spoiling to fight. 

“The females will have to make do with the second largest male this season!” Volstagg exclaimed, showing off the immense rack of antlers they had taken as a trophy, along with a vast scaly hide stretched between two trees to dry. An enormous haunch of meat was sizzling over the camp fire, filling the air with a mouth-watering scent.

Sif, who was scrubbing dried blood off her breast plate, said, “I don’t know if he was the biggest, but he was certainly the meanest.” 

“You can hardly blame him for being upset, seeing as how we were trespassing on his harem before he even got a chance to service the ladies,” Fandral pointed out. His smile was undimmed by his split lip and the shallow cut across his cheek.

“Do any of you need healing?” Besides his small skill with healing spells, Loki tended to carry more medicinal supplies, while the others had only a few bandages, salves and healing stones between them.

He looked at each of them in turn, trying to assess the damage. His initial worry was wearing off. They all seemed cheerful and no worse than after an especially vigorous sparring session. All the injuries he could see had already been treated.

The five of them had been going into danger well before he had met them, of course, but that didn’t prevent Loki from feeling a twinge of guilt that they had faced this hazard without him.

“I didn’t expect you to run into anything dangerous out here while I was gone.”

Thor swept his concerns aside with a laugh and handed Loki a cup of mead. “It was nothing we could not handle!”

“If you wanted to hunt a bull bilgesnipe, why not wait and find one alone?” Loki half-complained after a long swallow. “What would you have done if the females had turned on you?”

Twice the height of an Aesir at the shoulder, a bull bilgesnipe was bad tempered, swift and armed with a sweeping expanse of wickedly sharp horns, and slashing hoof hoofs that could cave in a man’s head, but the females, though smaller and with only short pronged horns, were infinitely more dangerous. Their herds could number in the hundreds, and when they encountered a threat, they would form ranks around their young, then charge all together, in an attempt to trample any predator or hunter not swift enough to outrun them. Only griffins or wyverns, able to fly away with their catch, would attempt to snatch calves from the herd. 

“We would have leaped up on their backs and ridden them away,” Thor jested.

“Though it would have taken two to carry our large friend here,” Fandral thumped Volstagg’s shoulder. “He would have had to stand astride them with one foot on each.”

“There were trees,” Hogun told Loki, serious as usual. “We would have climbed them.”

“I think the females assumed we were some strange kind of challengers,” Sif mused. “And they aren’t as aggressive when they don’t have calves to defend.”

“You don’t suppose they were expecting Thor to service them, since he was the one who dealt the killing blow?” Fandral snickered. 

“With you there to tempt them, I doubt my prowess in battle would have been enough,” Thor shot back, grinning.

Loki smiled along, settling down on a rug and had another sip. The mead was strong and sweet, and cold from being left in a nearby stream.

Sif looked over at him, curiously. “How was your hunt? Did you find a portal?”

Thor had let his friends in on his quest, of course, though only when Loki was fairly sure his obscuring spells were efficacious at turning Heimdal’s gaze aside.

“I did,” Loki nodded. “More suddenly than I was expecting, actually. I fell through it.”

“That sounds even more dangerous than running into battling bilgesnipes,” she said, her gaze sharpening. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” he assured her. “I was lucky, though. I’m going to have to put together some protection charms.”

Vostagg carved off some of the meat and wrapped it in bread, then asked around a large bite, “So where’d you end up?”

“Jotunheim,” Loki said, and was pleased by their looks of appreciation.

“Dangerous,” Hogun commented sagely.

“Did you see any Frost Giants?” Fandral inquired. “I’ve heard they are half man and half woman, and they run around mostly naked.”

“You’d do better to stick to the bilgesnipe,” Thor admonished his overly romantic friend. “They are likely no uglier or able to kill you, but at least they can’t freeze your manhood off with a look.”

Loki’s pleasure shriveled at his prince’s obvious contempt for Jotuns. He knew his birth people were not loved by the Aesir, of course; they had been bitter adversaries since well before he’d been born.

“You two are disgusting,” Sif exclaimed, disapproving.

“I didn’t see anything except snow and stars,” Loki replied stiffly, when they turned expectantly back to him. “It was freezing, and I just wanted to get back.”

“We could go there and have a look for ourselves,” Thor suggested. “That would be a venture worthy of our time.”

“What? No!” Loki’s voice was half-strangled with fear.

“Thor,” Sif propelled herself to her feet, “Of all the laws of Asgard, this is the one you must not break.”

“This isn’t like a journey to Earth, where you summon a little lightening and thunder and the mortals worship you as a god. Fandral was also uncharacteristically serious. “This is Jotunheim!”

As he assembled a new roll of bread and meat, Volstagg declared, “If the Frost Giants don’t kill you, your father will.”

“My father fought his way into Jotunheim,” Thor asserted, “Defeated their armies and took their Casket. We would just be looking around a bit.”

“It is forbidden!” Sif reiterated.

Thor only laughed, and turned on his charm. “My friends,” he appealed, “Have you forgotten all that we have done together?”

He advanced on Fandral, inquiring, “Who was it that brought you into the sweet embrace of the most exotic maidens in all of Ygdrasil?”

Despite himself, Fandral smiled nostalgically at some recollection. “Well,” he admitted, “You helped a little.”

Thor clapped him on the shoulder and moved on to Hogun, “And who led you into the most glorious of battles?”

Hogun smiled as much as he ever did and confessed, “You did.”

“And to delicacies so succulent you thought you’d died and gone to Vahalla?” Thor reminded Volstagg.

The older man chuckled weakly, looking down momentarily before looking back up at his prince. “You did.”

“Yes!” Thor continued to enthuse, turning to Sif, who was looking unconvinced, “And who proved wrong all those who scoffed at the idea that a young maiden could be one of the fiercest warriors this realm has ever know?”

Sif considered briefly. “I did.”

“True,” Thor acknowledged, smiling. “But I supported you.”

Loki never ceased to be in awe of Thor’s charisma, and even though he knew Sif knew better, she smiled back at Thor. 

“My friends, trust me now!” Thor urged. “We must do this! You aren’t going to let Loki and me take all the glory, are you?” He included Loki with a casual wave of his arm.

“What?” Loki was reeling, feeling the situation spiraling out of control.

“You are coming with me, aren’t you?”

“No!” His shout came out half-strangled.

Thor was astonished, then his face began to waver between hurt and anger, and Loki scrambled for an excuse. A reason. A lie.

“None of you can go,” he insisted. “I mean, you couldn’t get back. The portal back is in the air. Very high up. If I hadn’t been able to change into a bird, I would have been trapped there.”

This seemed to mollify Thor. He thought it over. “We could ask Heimdal to bring us home,” he suggested.

Loki tried a different tactic. “Do you really want to take the chance of him or your father finding out about what we are trying to do? Before we get the Crown for him?” 

Thor’s face cleared, and he cuffed Loki on the arm with an approving smile. “You’re right, of course. We will go to Jotunheim some other time, after I have won Mjölnir.”

Not if I can help it, Loki thought, but it didn’t seem the time or place to try to persuade Thor to think more positively of the Jotnar, even if he had known of anything positive to say, except that they were not the monsters that the Aesir so often made them out to be. All his information about his world and people came from brief mentions in books written by Vanir and Elven scholars. He simply didn’t know that much about them.

But now, if he dared, Loki had a way to remedy that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks to tilla123 for helping me find errors and making suggestions and generally encouraging me to write!


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the long wait, everyone. 
> 
> As always, thanks to everyone who left kudos and comments, and undying gratitude to tilla123 for all her cheerleading and help in catching errors!

At the threshold of Fensalir, Thor paused to reconsider one last time before plunging into the women's domain that was the Queen’s palace. When he had been a small boy, he had loved being here, loved being with his mother and cosseted by her handmaidens. He had loved playing with the pageboys and serving girls, who were older children who would have likely scorned to play with one so much younger than they, had he not been their prince. It had made him feel very grown up, then. Now he felt as if coming here shrank him down to that small boy once again. 

Many of his mother’s serving women were the same, if a little grayer and a little stouter, and they all seemed to see him as that same child they had dandled on their knees, even while they craned back their heads to peer up at him and crow about how he had grown. Then they would fuss about the state of his clothes, or that he should comb his hair, or wash his face, and their gazes would sneak down to check that he was not leaving muddy footprints in his wake.

The new, younger pages and maids were all shy and worshipful, which was nice enough in small doses, but Thor didn’t like to get them reprimanded by their elders, which is what invariably happened when they were caught flocking about him instead of attending to their work.

It was all rather uncomfortable, which is why Thor preferred to see his mother during meals, or in her rooms at the main palace, which were smaller and easier to escape, but today he wasn’t looking for his mother, but for her student, and this was the only place he knew to look for her.

He strode through the halls, trying to look purposeful so no one would stop him, but he didn’t have the first idea where the girl was quartered, or if she would be in them or elsewhere at her lessons. He knew she wasn’t with the Queen, because Frigga was at a luncheon with his father. This close to his name day, they might even be meeting to discuss his present, so he was running out of time to influence their decision.

But Fensalir was large, though not half the size of the main palace, and he was causing a great deal of disruption by peering through doorways. Eventually his mother’s seneschal, Syn, cornered him and politely demanded his business. 

“I am seeking my mother’s mage student, Amora,” Thor said, in his finest ‘I am your prince, you do not question me’ tone.

Syn, who had not only dandled Thor on her knees but had changed his swaddling clothes as an infant, was not impressed. 

“You have some business with Amora?” 

She probably thought he was looking for a tumble with the lass. Thor didn’t see how it was any business of hers either way, but he was much too canny to say so. Fortunately, he had managed to come up with what he considered a good reason.

“She and my own mage, Loki, studied together,” he explained. “We think she may be able to assist him with a problem that is giving him trouble.” For good measure, Thor finished with his best smile.

The smile, which was usually so helpful in winning over tavern maids and even sometimes Sif (though not in the same way) only served to make her even more suspicious.

“Why did Loki not come himself, then?” Syn asked. 

That was a good question, and one Thor had no answer for. He could hardly admit that he hadn’t mentioned this little visit to Loki, after all. But the quest for the Serpent Crown had been Amora’s idea in the first place, and Loki was being so slow about finding a way to Midgard. 

Before he could think of something, Amora came dashing up the hall from behind the older woman, gasping out, “It’s quite all right, Lady Syn! I can manage from here on.”

“Manage what, if I may ask?” Syn looked at the girl, or possibly her tight and low-cut gown, disapprovingly. “You are supposed to be at your lessons, are you not?”

Amora tossed her head, her gold hair bouncing like waves of wheat. “I am finished, or nearly enough. And I am sure the All-Mother would not mind my helping the prince and Loki with whatever they might need.”

She linked her arm through Thor’s before he could even offer and started leading him away.

“We will not keep her long,” Thor promised, as they made their escape. “It is no weighty matter, just a little consultation on magic.”

Syn frowned but did not follow them, and soon they were alone and able to duck into an empty store room. Amora turned and pressed herself against him, smiling warmly.

“Prince Thor. It is so nice to see you again!” She wriggled closer, turning her face up, lips slightly pursed to beg a kiss.

“And you as well,” he replied, easing back from her importuning. It wasn’t that he was opposed to the idea of a quick tumble with a pretty lass, but Amora was his mother’s charge, and she would skin him. Besides, it seemed unbecoming for a mage to play the tart. Such behavior could only bring shame on whoever she ended up serving, and Thor was glad his father had chosen Loki for him instead, and as a boy, though Thor still found that very strange when he chanced to think of it. 

“I needed to speak to you of that object you told me of,” he said, taking her hand in recompense. “Do you know any more about it, or how to get to the place it is being kept?”

She gave him a little pout, lowering her lashes. “Is Loki not serving you as well as you deserve, my prince?” 

“He is trying his best,” Thor defended. “But he claims this is no easy task. Thus far he has only found a single portal, for all his searching, and it does not lead to Midgard.”

“Perhaps he is being too cautious?” Amora suggested. “Or perhaps he is in no hurry to do anything that would diminish his own importance?”

Her jealousy was apparent, and Thor found it unattractive, but if he could use it to his purpose, he would. “So do you know a way?”

Smiling coyly, she snuggled up to him again. “I might, but you have to do something for me, if you want my help.”

“What?” he growled.

“It’s just a little favor,” she wheedled, tracing the lines of his armor with a fingertip. 

He took her by the wrist and stared down at her, sternly. “What favor?”

“I want to go with you,” she pleaded, gazing up at him with huge, beryl green eyes. “I want to help.”

“No,” he said, adamantly, imagining what a nuisance she would be, if they should have to do anything strenuous or hazardous. 

“Please? I never get to go anywhere, or do anything exciting. I can help, truly I can.”

“It is too risky,” Thor said, hoping to frighten her. Midgard was not supposed to be a dangerous world. It’s inhabitants were weak, short-lived primitives, but one never knew. There might be sea monsters. Besides, Fandral would be so distracted by her that he’d be useless, Sif would be so disgusted she might not go at all, and Loki would not be happy that Thor was asking another mage for assistance on a problem that Thor had given to him.

“I’m not afraid.” She ran her free hand up his arm, stroking the taut muscles. “You are so strong and brave, Prince Thor. I am sure you and your loyal companions can protect me from any danger. Besides,” she smiled brightly, “I am a mage. I can look out for myself.”

If the girl was determined to play the harlot, Thor would treat her so, he decided, taking her into his arms and giving her a chiding grin.

“I am certain you could, if you were allowed,” he soothed, “But it will not be like the stories, you know. Adventuring is uncomfortable and dirty work, and not for such tender beauties as yourself. Just tell me what you know, and I will bring you back something pretty, I promise.”

“You can get your mother to grant permission for me to use my magic to help you,” Amora argued. “I know she will do it for you, my prince.” She put her arms up around his neck and lay her head against his chest. Her wheat gold hair tickled his nose and filled it with the spicy, musky scent of her perfume.

“You don’t know what it is like, being shut up in this palace with nothing to do but study dry, dusty books and do boring lessons.”

Thor felt his resolve crumbling under the weight of this plea. He’d had plenty of boring lessons, and been forced to read a few of those tedious books himself, before he’d been given Loki, who actually seemed to enjoy reading and study.

“Please, my prince!” she looked up, her eyes awash with unshed tears.

He sighed and set her back a little, reminding her, “I am not your prince, Amora. I do not hold your bond.”

“You are my prince in my heart, though,” she said. Her eyes flashed with green fire, but no tears overflowed. Thor was glad of that, at least. Weeping women discomfited him no end. 

Her voice went low, and her delicate features were suddenly altered into a warrior’s determination. “I should be your mage. I would be far better for you than Loki could ever be. I would help make you Asgard’s greatest king ever!” 

Thor chuckled at her sudden ferocity. “I am sure you would. Whoever you end up serving will be lucky to have you.”

“I only wish to serve you, my- Prince Thor,” she insisted. “And I must, if you wish to gain the Serpent Crown. I know the way, and you need me with you!”

Thor shook her a little. Not as much as he wanted to, though. “If you truly wish to serve me, just tell me the way.”

“I have to go with you, to find the portals,” Amora told him.

“Loki has a stone that can find portals,” Thor countered. “Just tell me what you know.”

She looked surprised at that, but quickly rallied. “Does his stone tell him which portals are the right ones?” 

She smiled again at his annoyed expression. “I thought not. I can find them by scrying, and Loki cannot.”

“Why not?”

“Not all mages are equally skilled at the same things. I am better than Loki at many things.”

That sounded somewhat plausible, although Thor suspected Loki was better at more, or else his parents wouldn’t have chosen him. 

“Can you not just scry and tell me or Loki where the portal is? I will take you somewhere afterwards. Somewhere nice,” he promised.

“It is more than one portal, but I can only scry one at a time,” she asserted. “The first one is on Alfheim, so we can go there by Bifrost, but I need to be there to scry for the next one, so you have to let me come with you, and you have to get your mother to give me permission to use magic.”

Thor struggled not to grind his teeth. He supposed he might be able to get permission to escort Amora to Alfheim; it was a safe, peaceful realm, but he had no idea how he might manage the other issue.  
“How am I supposed to do that?”

She stood up on her tiptoes and lightly kissed his cheek, smiling mischievously. “I am sure you will think of something, my prince.”

 

~~~~~~

 

When her son had asked to speak privately with her after dinner, Frigga had been pleased but apprehensive. She knew Thor loved her, but he seldom sought her out. She hoped he was not in some fix that he didn’t want his father to know about.

She led him one of the small receiving rooms off the great hall, and took a seat. It was one of her favorite rooms, and she had made certain that the heavy gold chairs and benches were all well cushioned with silk pillows, and had rich tapestries hung, tent-like, overhead to conceal the high ceiling. It made the room more cozy and intimate, unlike most of the palace’s hard and imposing decor.

Her son chose to remain standing. He seemed a bit nervous, but she sensed no deep anxiety, so hopefully the matter was not too serious.

“What is it you wished to speak to me about?” she asked.

He hesitated, shuffling his feet, then, rushed out with, “It’s about your student, Amora.”

“What about her?” Frigga held back a frown. After all, there was no call to leap to conclusions.

“Well, you see,” Thor took a seat at last, and leaned forward, “I was talking to her this afternoon.”

The frown emerged despite Frigga’s intentions to be openminded. She was well aware of the girl’s thwarted ambitions to be Thor’s mage. “Why would she be speaking to you?”

“She has been helping Loki with a problem- a magical thing. I just wanted to see if she had made any progress.” Thor explained, somewhat too hastily.

“I see,” Frigga nodded, though she was somewhat skeptical of this. Loki and Amora had been more rivals than friends when they had studied together. Still, Amora was not an untalented girl, when she was willing to apply herself.

“It isn’t anything important,” Thor said, which made her think it probably was. Still, she wasn’t going to pry unless she absolutely had to. She wanted her son to open up to her on his own.

“I am afraid I don’t understand the problem,” she prodded gently, when it seemed Thor’s tongue had stuck fast to roof of his mouth.

“It’s just that, well,” Thor waved his hands as if to grasp the right words from midair, “She was telling me how lonely she was, with Loki gone.”

“Really?” Frigga considered this doubtfully. She hadn’t thought the self-centered girl would care that much, but it was true that she was very much alone these days. Frigga only had an hour or two on most days to instruct her, and she had lessons to fill her time, but there was no one else for her to talk to in Fensalir, except the servants, and while Frigga knew that the servants were all courteous, the difference in station was too great for friendship. 

A bonded mage might be a servant of a sort in the eyes of most of Asgard, but they were also highly educated advisors to their lords and ladies, which made them practically nobles themselves in the eyes of cooks and chambermaids, and they had magic beyond the types of healing and midwifery and house blessing that Asgardians found comfortable. 

Frigga had seen the alienation of her students for centuries, and there was nothing she could do about it except try to instill a sense of purpose and ensure they were properly matched up with guardians that they would like, or at least get along with.

“I suppose she might be,” the queen conceded graciously, “But how is this your concern? You have your own mage.”

“I know,” Thor agreed, nodding. “I just thought, since she was so kind as to help Loki, that we could do something for her. Let her go on a little outing to Alfheim with me and Loki and our friends.”

“I don’t know,” she mused aloud, thinking the idea over. If it had not been Amora, Frigga would have thought this an innocent enough plan, but the girl was too flirtatious and scheming for comfort.

“Just this once, please? As a reward for helping Loki?”

“Thor, you know you cannot dally with Amora, right?” Frigga hated that she sounded just like her own mother saying this, but it had to be said.

He flapped his hands in negation, making a face. “It’s not like that, mother!”

“Because I know she’s a very attractive girl-“

“Mother!” Thor squirmed in his seat. “It’s really not like that!”

“And I know she’s got a little crush on you,” she forged on.

“I know, but I’m not interested in her that way! It’s just a favor to her for helping us out!”

Frigga studied him and decided he was being truthful, at least about not being attracted to Amora. “What about your friends?”

Thor winced slightly. “Fandral will flirt outrageously, but Sif and I can keep him from going too far,” he promised.

“What is it you plan to do on Alfheim?” she asked.

Thor brightened, sensing her impending concession. “We are going to try to capture a unicorn.”

Ah. Well, that was a more understandable explanation about why Thor and his friends would wish to have the girl along, and would at least ensure that Amora would not manage to lose her virginity before the beast was ensnared.

“Unicorns can be quite dangerous,” she reminded him. “Not as much as bilge snipe, perhaps, but Amora has no experience with hunting.”

“I know,” Thor replied earnestly. “That’s why we want you to grant her permission to use her magic freely. So she can defend herself if she needs too.”

“She’s never used her magic that way,” Frigga said, concerned they would overestimate the girl’s abilities.

“Loki can teach her a few defense spells before we start. It will be perfectly safe! She said she would like to get to use her magic sometime, not just practice it all the time, Mother!”

“Very well,” Frigga gave in, but added, “Just this once, Thor. I know it seems unfair to her to be stuck here without any friends,” How well she knew it, “But she is going to be assigned to a lord of her own as soon as a suitable position becomes available, so it would not be kind of you to let her get any ideas to the contrary!”

He bounced up and tugged her to her feet as well to hug his thanks. “Just this once, I promise.”


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm baaaaaaack! Woohoo! Yeah, baby! Inspired by the long prayed for return of Plausible Deniability by lord_hades (which is so freaking awesome and you must go read it), I have returned to this story! 
> 
> The next chapter is half done, so I promise you will not have to wait so long for an update... this time. 
> 
> Thanks as always to my wonderful beta reader, tilla123 for all her help!
> 
>  
> 
> ~~~~~~

Sif turned out to be even more difficult to convince than his mother, when he asked her to stay and speak privately after a sparring session.

“You want me to lie to the All-Mother.” It was not a question, and heavily freighted with disapproval, dangerously close to an accusation.

“No,” Thor denied. It sounded so much worse when she said it like that. She leveled the deathly eyebrows at him, and Thor was struck by how much sterner his friend looked as a brunette. Much more lethal eyebrows. “Not really lie,” he attempted to soothe, “I mean, we are going to Alfheim to on a quest for something magical.”

Sif’s eyes, normally a warm blue, were now the color of cold dwarven steel. The kind that held an edge so sharp as to make the very air bleed. “Thor… That seems a very large lie to me. We aren’t planning to stay long on Alfheim, and a unicorn is a known danger, while this crown of serpents isn’t. And you want me to be responsible for Amora.”

Thor hadn’t, especially, but it had been the only way his mother would allow the wretched girl along. 

“Just for her magic. She promised to listen to me and stay out of the way if things get too dangerous.”

Snorting softly, Sif leaned back on her bench, pushing a sweaty tendril of hair out of her face. “I don’t know…”

“I know you dislike Amora, for some reason.” At least, Sif turned as stiff and cold as the fabled queen of Hel every time they crossed paths.

“She’s rude to Loki. She’s tried to make trouble for him.” Sif sniffed, disapprovingly.

Thor shrugged one shoulder and picked at a bit of dirt that had gotten stuck to his vambrace during practice. “She was upset when she was passed over for Loki. She’s older and has been studying with my mother longer.”

“It was the All-Father’s decision,” Sif declared. “She should accept it graciously, and not be so ambitious.”

Thor decided on a new approach. “Would you have accepted it graciously if the All-Father had said you couldn’t become a shield maiden?” he challenged. He didn’t think she would. Sif had defied her family and convention for decades now. She was still having to to pit herself against those who argued that she should stop trying to be a warrior and be a more conventional Asgardian woman, even after she had proved herself in the contests.

His friend winced at the idea, and he pressed the advantage. “And what’s wrong with having ambition? With wanting to be more than people say you can? Hasn’t Loki been ambitious too, in a way, by learning to fight and going along with us on our adventures? Everyone keeps saying that isn’t what a mage should be doing.”

It wasn’t everyone, but more than one of his father’s counselors had tried to give him a hard time about it. Thor didn’t really think they cared so much about Loki; they just wanted him to come to more of their dreadfully dull meetings.

Now Sif was visibly wavering, though.

“She just wants the chance to show what she can do, before she gets stuck working for some boring official who won’t need anything exciting from her, ever.” 

Or so she had said. Thor figured it was true that was to be her future, based on the kinds of things Loki said were his ‘expected duties’. Studying dry books and reports and attending meetings. Even if Asgard went to war and mages were needed on the battlefield, it would be the male mages, he assumed. Asgard hadn’t been to war in his lifetime, but he had seen a few mages assigned to the army during skirmishes against raiders and rogue factions of dark elves. He was not unaware that Amora hoped to use him to gain something better. He wasn’t adverse to that, though it wasn’t going to be what the silly girl seemed to be hoping for, with her foolish notions of romance.

“I don’t know, Thor.” Sif’s boots scuffed at the sand under her heels as she considered.

“Amora was the one who found out about the crown in the first place,” Thor urged. “And she says she can find the way. Isn’t it only fair that she should get to come?”

“Loki won’t like it. He’s been doing his best on this, and now you’re just going to replace him?”

“I’m not replacing him!” Thor protested, leaning forward. “She’s just going to help find the way, which is the only part he says he hasn’t got figured out. He’s just stuck on that, and finding portals his way isn’t working. He can’t figure out how to tell which ones go where until he finds them and goes through them. Finding a way to Midgard that way will take forever.”

“I’m certain he’ll come up with a method, if you just give him time.”

“He’s really clever, I know” Thor agreed. “And he’s a lot more useful than I ever thought he’d be, when Father foisted him off on me. But I’ve been thinking…”

“Uh-oh,” Sif teased, “Don’t hurt yourself!”

“Very funny,” Thor smiled and jabbed at her, good-naturedly. She blocked him easily. “Anyhow, I was thinking that when I am king, Loki won’t be able to do everything for me. He’ll be just one of my advisors, not my only one.”

“Yeeess…” Sif provisionally agreed.

“That’s because one person can’t know or do everything,” Thor continued, more sure of his ground. “It’s not reasonable for Loki to be expected to be able to do everything on his own. It’s no slight on his abilities. He says he has everything else planned out. Spells to let us breath underwater, and he has learned the shapes of Midgardian animals to help us get to Atlantis, and he found it’s location in the library. He’s done good work. I’ll be sure he knows I’m pleased with him. I am. Truly.”

“I still don’t see why we can’t just tell your father and ask him to send us by Bifrost. He’s allowed us go on other missions for to look for treasures and relics.”

“He doesn’t want anyone going to Midgard,” Thor grumbled. “It’s almost as forbidden as Jotunheim.”

“Maybe he has a good reason for that.”

Thor heaved his shoulders, uncomfortable. “It’s something about not interfering with mortals. But we aren’t going to interfere. We’re going to help them, by getting something dangerous off their world before it causes damage.”

“Sounds like it might be considered interfering to me,” Sif said dryly. “You should really talk to the All-Father, Thor.”

“I’m not good at talking to him. I have to show him.” Odin always made him feel like a boy, somehow. “Besides, if I ask him and he says ‘no’, we’ll have missed our chance.”

Sif sighed. “I just know I’m going to regret this.” 

“You’ll do it?”

“Yes, all right,” she said, breathless at the end as he swept her into a crushing hug.

“Let go, I can’t breathe!” she squeaked.

He released her, beaming. “Thank you, Sif!”

Rolling her eyes, she explained, “I figure I can agree to this, or you’ll just come up with an even more dangerous plan to try and win Mjolnir by your nameday.”

“I was considering searching for Bor’s axe,” he grinned. “Since Loki did find that way into Jotunheim.”

Sif looked horrified. “Thor! You wouldn’t.”

“It seems there’s no need, since we are going to Midgard.”

Sif groaned and whacked him sharply on the arm. “I am going to bathe. Don’t do anything insane without me.”

“I would not dream of it,” Thor promised.

 

~~~~~~

 

Loki had always wanted to visit Alfheim. Some of his earliest memories were of his foster mother, Jora, telling him bedtime stories in his nursery. He had been aware even that young that magic was their shared talent, thus tales about magical places and people were his favorite. Stories of the Elven realm had fired his imagination and crept into his dreams. Jora would smile at his pleading and oblige him with stories of the beautiful Ljosalfar, but being always aware of her duty to raise him as a loyal future vassal to the All-Father, her stories were usually more about the heroism and nobility of that mighty king, and the many times the Aesir had saved the gentle Light Elves from certain doom at the hands of their enemies, the Dark Elves. 

The elderly head cook of the castle, Hilde, was more generous with tales of vast enchanted forests filled with unicorns and winged cats, and coves with mermaids, and tiny faeries who rode on the backs of hummingbirds and farmed tiny orchards of trees that grew fruit-flavored candies. She would ‘prove’ the existence of these by giving him a handful of tiny, sugary fruits, crunchy sweet on the outside and bursting with tart juice. 

When he’d been a little older, he’d come to doubt his Hilde, thinking these were treats of her own making. Later still, he had found reference to those unlikely little farmers in more than one book in the libraries of both Vanaheim and Asgard, but by that time the old cook had retired. He still had no idea if the little candies had been made or grown, but they had a magical flavor in his memories, and he had never lost his desire to come to this realm, and perchance see those miniature sweet cultivators, and all the other wonderful things he’d heard of as a child.

Now he was here, and it was every bit as beautiful and wondrous as he’d imagined. The sky was the color of amethyst, with glowing pink clouds. Flocks of jewel colored birds swooped and dived, chasing insects no less bright. The Bifrost had put them down in an emerald valley, bisected by a lazy turquoise river, and while there were no mermaids, there were mostly naked elves no larger than his hand who were fishing from the backs of long legged, long necked birds with plumage whiter than snow. Magic thrummed in the very air, making Loki’s bones hum and his blood sing.

It was all he’d ever imagined, and he wished there was more time to explore and learn. But despite the sweetness of the air, there was a sour taste in his mouth, to match the sourness of his mood, because he was traversing this beautiful place in the wake of a far too-smug Amora, whose presence here he did not understand. 

He had had precious little time to prepare for this journey, and had already been on edge about Thor’s vague promises of having found a new source of information. Being blindsided at finding Amora waiting with Sif when he, Thor and the Warriors Three arrived at the Observatory had been enough to hone anxiety to anger. But he could hardly argue about it in front of Heimdall, and once they had arrived here, Thor had claimed she was only there to be of help, and that there was no cause for Loki to be concerned for his position. Then he’d brushed off Loki’s spluttering protest, saying they needed to be getting on with the quest.

Sif fell in step beside Loki, and let her gaze follow his to where Thor strode at the head of their party, Amora clinging to his arm. Fandral and Hogun flanked them, Fandral to have a closer view of Amora, and Hogun to guard his prince. Loki had fallen back to brood, and Sif had joined him. Volstagg was further behind with the baggage, and with their supplies. Loki hoped he would not eat everything before they even got to Midgard, much less back.

“I’m not happy about this either,” Sif said, though Loki had not said as much. “At least you don’t have to be responsible for her.”

“I am not jealous,” Loki muttered. “I just don’t understand what she’s doing here.”

“Thor says she can find us the quickest route through the portals,” Sif shrugged. “Thor did say this whole scheme was her idea in the first place.”

“What?” Loki almost stumbled in surprise. 

Sif raised a brow at his unusual clumsiness. “Why are you so surprised? Amora is shallow, I’ll grant you, but she would not be studying with the All-Mother if she wasn’t talented, right?”

“The first gateway is only an hour’s walk,” Amora was promising, somehow managing to press herself even closer to Thor. She was dressed practically for travel, or as practically as her wardrobe likely allowed, in a snug, sleeveless tunic of poison green, so low cut in the bodice as to leave very little to the imagination, and tight black leather leggings and boots.

Loki uncharitably hoped all their jumps would lead to really cold places, and that she’d not bothered to bring along anything warmer.

Shaking off this thought, he answered Sif, who was still waiting. Before replying, he took her arm and slowed so they were both far back enough to not be overheard, and he kept his voice down. “She’s good, yes,” he admitted. “Better than me at some things.”

Sif followed along, nearly whispering. “So why are you so surprised she came up with this plan? If you ask me, it was a brilliant way to get Thor to pay attention to her.”

“True,” Loki bit his lip, trying to find a way to frame the wrongness he sensed about the idea. “It’s just, I can’t think where she would have come across the information. She’s still a student, and a lot of things are off limits to students, and she’s never been curious about anything that didn’t directly affect her.”

“Maybe she scried for something that would make Thor notice her? The same way she says she can scry out the right portals?”

He shook his head. “Scrying doesn’t work that way.” 

A huffing Volstagg had caught up to them, and Loki gave up his questions as the rotund warrior engaged him and Sif on the subject of possibly pausing for lunch soon.

When they did stop, Amora imperiously summoned him. Since she was standing next to an expectant Thor, he could hardly refuse to answer.

“My Prince?” Loki bowed slightly, emphasizing his relationship to Thor while ignoring the female who was all but plastered to his side.

She bit out, “We need your gem to find the portal.”

This startled Loki out of his plan to pretend she wasn’t there. “Why? I thought you’d scried for it.”

“I know it’s near here somewhere,” she replied, waving blithely.

“How do you scry out a general location? What spells did you use as a starting point?”

“It isn’t a spell you know,” Amora waspishly proclaimed. “Just check your gem compass thing! Or better yet, just give it to me already. We don’t actually need you to do this.”

Loki put his hand to the stone, secure on a sturdy gold chain around his neck and hidden under his tunic and armored coat. “I just want to understand what you are doing.”

Thor drew his arm out of Amora’s grip and stepped between her and Loki. “Please, Loki,” he urged, “Just tell us if there is a portal near here.”

Reluctantly, Loki pulled out the wayfarer’s stone and held it level, looking down. One of the facets was indeed brightly lit, indicating a nearby gate to some other realm. Two other facets were dim and dimmer, showing more distant ones.

“There is one nearby to the east,” he admitted, turning to look in that direction. The river was that way, much wider now with barely a ripple to dislodge its reflections of the vaulting sky. More of the white birds fished along the bank, but these were without riders. The other side looked to be more forested, probably just the sort of place they might go to find a unicorn.

“See?” Amora smirked. “Just as I promised.”

“You said we would need to travel through more than one portal,” Thor said, also gazing across the river as if hoping to see it. “So where does this one lead?”

Amora’s smile slipped, and she shrugged as if unconcerned. “I know not, except that it leads to the next portal.”

“That makes no sense!” Loki exploded. “Not if you are scrying. Soothsaying, maybe…” 

A rare, difficult talent that Frigga had been rumored to possess, though she had never once spoken of it. Loki struggle to recall what little he had read of it and shook his head. 

“No, not that either,” he decided. 

“You’ve always thought you were better than me at everything, but do not know everything, Loki No One’s Son,” Amora sneered sweetly.

“No one knows everything,” Sif thrust her statement in like a dagger thrust. “That is the point of asking questions, which is all Loki, of the House of Odin, is doing.”

Fandral looked mildly relieved at Sif’s putting Amora in her place; Loki assumed the dashing warrior agreed with Sif’s sentiments, but did not feel strongly enough on the matter to ruin his chances at a possible sexual conquest. Hogun’s typical lack of expression revealed nothing, but the stoic warrior usually sided with Sif. 

 

Ever the peacemaker, Volstagg finished chewing his a large mouthful of travel bread and cheese, cleared his throat a few times and offered, “Surely there’s no call for argument. We came to find a portal, and we found one. I say we simply go through it and have a look around. See if Lady Amora can find the next one.”

“An excellent notion!” Thor’s raised voice and ‘friendly’ blow between Loki’s shoulder blades brooked no arguments. It did not quite stagger him, since he had seen it coming, and he forebore to show any discomfort as Amora slithered back to Thor’s side and recaptured his hand, smiling victoriously.

“I will go find the portal and see where it leads,” Loki declared, as firmly as he could manage. “But first we should set up camp. I need to cast some spells to cover our departure.”

“All right,” Sif began, but Amora overrode her, “That won’t be necessary.”

“Yes it is,” Loki argued, getting even more annoyed. “If we are to have any chance of hiding this from Heimdall-“

“It’s all taken care of,” Amora said breezily. 

“What?” Sif choked.

“Would you care to explain that a bit more?” Fandral urged, his brows disappearing under the fringe of his blond hair.

“You’ve hidden us from Heimdall,” Loki said, disbelievingly. He crossed his arms, staring at Amora’s pretty, self-satisfied smile.

She hesitated a breath, then tossed her head. “Yes. We can go on our journey without any worry about the Guardian.”

“Tell me how you managed that,” Loki demanded. “Because I do not believe you.”

“How dare you accuse me of lying!” Amora bristled, cat-like to the point of curling her free hand into a sharp nailed claw prepared to lash out. Her green eyes burned with fury.

“Even I am not sure the spells I have come up with will work to hide us,” Loki snapped back. “And I’ve been studying for most of a year on the problem.”

“Well, I am sure!” she spat. “And I do not have to tell you anything! You just want to steal my secrets for yourself!”

“Magic is not about secrets!” Loki barely managed not to yell. 

“Yes it is,” she retorted. “It is secrets and power, and what I have is mine, and I will choose who I give it to.”

No, the All-Father will choose, Loki thought, biting his tongue to keep from saying it aloud. That was the law of Asgard. From the embarrassed silence from everyone else, he was not the only one thinking it. 

Ever quick witted, Fandral smiled placatingly at Amora and said, “If Loki’s got his spells prepared, I think we may as well let him go ahead. A little extra protection never hurt, right?”

“An excellent notion,” Volstagg agreed. “We can have lunch.”

“As long as it doesn’t take too long,” Thor said. “I am eager to go on.”

Loki swallowed down resentment and stalked off to begin the carefully prepared illusions and cover spells that he’d so laboriously learned at Thor’s request. Sif and the Warrior’s three made a small cook fire and saw to the pack horses.

When he was done, there was an illusory hunting camp, complete with copies of them all, going about the typical activities of camp. He had made it all as realistic as he could, but he held out little hope that it would fool Heimdall, if Heimdall was paying attention. 

“Will Heimdall not notice there are two of all us?” Sif asked, when he had done. She was watching her own clone sharpen a dagger.

Fandral, also looking at his copy, insisted, “I am much more attractive than that.”

“Can we go now?” Amora asked, impatiently. “Or is there something else you want to waste time on?”

Giving her a look, Loki turned to Thor to say, “I’ll locate the portal.”

The cold anger that was threatening to turn hot and boil over instead melted like frost in the sun as his prince turned a blinding smile on him. “Thank you, Loki.”

“You’re welcome, Thor,” he answered, taking the gem and it’s chain off and setting it down on the ground. He noted Amora’s rapacious stare. It probably influenced his shapeshifting, since he forsook his more frequent magpie form for an large silver ruffed eagle, with a wicked curved beak and long, sharp talons to ward off theft.

Gathering the chain in a tight grip, he launched himself in a storm of wings that drove the others back, and soared across the river, reveling in the updrafts from the sun-warmed water. Landing on the far shore, he changed back and oriented the gem, only to find it now pointed back the way he had come. Which meant either he had been too hasty in crossing the river, or that the portal was somewhere midstream. 

“Did you find it yet?” came the distant yell of a tiny Thor on the other side. Norns, but he was as eager as a young hound on his first hunt.

“Not yet!” Loki used magic to send his own voice; it was more elegant than shouting. Then he forestalled any further questions or demands by putting the gem down, turning into an otter and diving into the river with the chain in his teeth.

The river was fairly shallow here, and almost warm as bath water. The current was so slow as to barely be noticable. Loki paddled out to nearly the middle and rolled up onto his back on the surface, balancing the gem carefully on his stomach and trying to take a sighting on the portal’s position while still keeping the chain in his teeth. It took some doing, but eventually he centered in on a wide, dark crevice between two boulders along the river bed. 

A submerged log served as a secure hook for the necklace while he changed back to his Vanir form, minus all but his small clothes. Forming a bubble of air over his face and wrapping himself in protective spells, he swam down and in into the suddenly colder waters.

The cleft opened out into a lightless tunnel. He groped along the sides and the bottom, expecting to emerge soon into a different realm, but instead it widened to the point he could no longer reach the other side, or the top, and it went on and on. If he had been swimming, he would have long since run out of breath.

A mage light was of no help, because the water was thick with fine brown silt that he stirred up with every move, and the light was unable to penetrate it. He could only continue pulling himself along by the stones of the tunnel wall, rough beneath a coat of slimy algae. 

Once, something cold and slippery touched his back, and he almost cracked his skull on an outcropping of rock when he jumped. But it was only a fish, attracted to his light. A small school of glittering minnows formed around him, darting this way and that. Little fish attracted bigger fish, though, and he missed the comforting protection of his armored coat, but it would be heavy and difficult to swim in, and soaked when he came out. Instead, he strengthened the charms around him.

It was difficult to keep track of direction in the gloom, but he could tell the tunnel was not straight. Sometimes he felt he was going down, sometimes up, and more than once he changed directions so sharply he could not help but wonder if this was a single tunnel, or a maze of tunnels, and if he was going to to become hopelessly turned around. He decided the best course of action was to be still and wait for the water to clear so he could see. When at last it grew less clouded, he could just barely make out a dim glow somewhere overhead. Relieved, he swam eagerly up towards the light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~~~~~~
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks to everyone sticking with this story, and welcome to new readers! I love feedback of all kinds. Love it. Need it. Want it. ^_^


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, another chapter already. Can you believe it? Me neither. Don't get used to it. ^_^
> 
>  
> 
> ~~~~~~

Breaking the surface of the water, Loki dispelled his bubble and took a cautious breath, treading water. Whatever realm he had come to, it appeared to be night, and as black a night as he’d ever seen. The air was cold, damp and strange, but not as strange as the night sky above him. There was no moon, but plenty of stars, though they appeared oddly close and a weird blue green. Perhaps some kind of atmospheric affect? In any case, their light was insufficient to show him which way to go next. 

He strained his ears, listening for any clue as to where he was, but only heard an occasional drip of water. No night birds, or insects called, and no frogs sang. The quiet was unnerving, and at last he gave in and created a mage light, hoping it would not call unwanted attention, and floated it up, letting it grow gradually brighter as it rose.

As he had hoped, the light revealed dry land nearby, but it also illuminated sights more beautiful and strange than he could have imagined. The sky was not the sky at all, but the roof of a vast cave, glittering with strands of what looked like crystal droplets among long stalactites. 

He swam to the nearest stony island and pulled himself up onto it, resting a moment before shedding as much water as he could, then summoning his clothes, along with his favorite pair of daggers. The chill eased, and he felt more at ease, though he well knew he could not relax. Who knew what danger might be lurking in this place? He had followed Thor and his friends into other caves where trolls had dwelt, not to mention the giant spiders, and packs of swift, venomous lizards that would not hesitate to attack large prey, counting on their poison to weaken it till it could be safely swarmed. He summoned a second light, and seeing nothing threatening nearby, took a moment to look back up at his first one, wanting to know what it was he had mistaken for stars.

They turned out to be worms. Translucent, glistening worms with glowing spots in their tails, like fireflies, and what he had taken for crystal beads were long strands of some sticky substance. As he watched, fascinated and appalled, an insect dove up into a cluster of them, attracted by the lights. It stuck fast, and its thrashing attracted the nearest worms. Loki decided he didn’t need to see what happened next. He needed to pay attention to his own surroundings, lest he blunder into some sticky net of his own. He put out the first light and took out his gem. Should he try to find the next portal before going back? Two of the gems facet gleamed, one brightly and one less so. Or was it three? The bright facet kept bleeding over into the next one, no matter how still he kept it. That had never happened before. He frowned, thinking.

Somewhere out in the gloom, something splashed; breaking the stillness and causing him to tense. He brightened his light, wanting to be able to see despite what he might be calling straight to him. Out on the water, something was moving, gliding towards him. It quickened its pace, and resolved into a long, narrow boat carrying a single figure. Loki put the gem back under his coat, wrapped one hand around his dagger hilt and waited, watching.

As the stranger came closer, he tried calling out “Hello?”

The figure in the boat, a small, skinny creature as best he could make out, didn’t answer him, but started to talk to itself in a raspy whisper. 

“It isn’t themses, is its? We doesn’t think it is themses. It glows like the pretties, and themses doesn’t like that.”

Unnerved, Loki backed away as the boat scraped ashore and disgorged a spidery little man with pointed ears, long limbs, huge protuberant eyes and pale, blue tinted skin. His first flashing thought was that it was Jotun, but it was smaller than even himself, and the eyes were dark, not red, and there were no raised lines on its skin, save some rather ugly scars. Its feet were bare and flipper-like, as were its hands. 

Had Amora been mistaken? Was this a denizen of Atlantis after all? His studies had indicated they were of a similar height and build as the land based Midgardians. This creature came up only to chest.

“Oh, it is a pretty,” the little creature clapped those long hands in delight and grinned, displaying a mouthful of sharp teeth, which he only knew of in a single race. 

“You’re a Dokkalfar? Is this Svartalfheim?” He’d never heard of them having webbed hands and feet, but he had read once that the dark elves had a high rate of birth defects, due to their profligate use of what other races considered dark magics. Or perhaps it had some shapeshifting ability itself? Such adaptations would be useful in this place.

It ignored his query, coming closer. Loki continued backing up, unnerved by the hungry look it was giving him, even if he was the larger, and well armed with blade and magic.

“It’s very pretty, very pretty. We will takes such good care of it, and hide it from themses. They won’t takes it away from us this time, oh no.”

“What are you talking about? Is this Svartalfheim or not?” Loki demanded, keeping out of reach.

It stopped chasing him, staring, blinking watering eyes at what was likely unaccustomed light. 

Loki gazed back, wondering if he was wrong. It was such a strange creature, not much like the few Dokkalfar he had seen in books, or on the rare diplomatic or trading mission in Vanaheim. Those beings had been darkly lovely, slender but strong with graceful limbs and delicate features. Like their bright cousins the Ljosalfar, they were shorter and slighter than the Aesir, though taller than the average dwarf. They tended to be vain as cats, and draped themselves in filmy bright silks and adorned themselves with gold and jewels. 

While this creature, person? wore no silk or precious gems, it showed the same love of adornment. Its single garment was a knee length tunic covered with colorful feathers, and it had a plethora of necklaces, rings, anklets and bracelets made of bone and wood and polished stones. Strangely, it wore rings of twisted gold in its ears, and they jingled faintly as it twitched them excitedly.

“Maybe not a pretty,” it said, consideringly. “But pretty enough.”

Loki couldn’t say the same for it, so he he stuck to trying to learn where he was. “Do you live here? Can you tell me what realm this is?”

“It doesn’t know?” The whatever it was tilted its head in a birdlike manner. “Is it lost? Is it lost like the pretty fishes?” It flashed those needle teeth again. “We loves the pretty fishes, yes we do.”

“Who is ‘we’?” Loki hoped there weren’t a lot of them, and that they weren’t anywhere close, if they were Dokkalfar. The dark elves were no friends of the Aesir or the Vanir, or even the Jotnar, if he were to reveal his true race. The dark elves were friends of no other race, and chancy allies at best.

“Oh, it is just us, just us, pretty not pretty. Just us now, till you came. We had other pretties, yes, but they are gone. Gone, gone, lost. Stolen!” it finished with a flash of anger. “They stole it from us, and we hates them. We hates them forever.”

“Who? What did they steal?” Loki could make no sense of any of this; he was beginning to think this alien being was mad. 

“Never mind, pretty!” It capered past him, causing him to nearly fall trying to stay out of reach. “Come and see,” it beckoned, turning to see if he would follow before going on. “Come see all my pretties.”

Not knowing what else to do, he went, keeping well back and watching for traps or ambush. The island was not as slippery as he would have assumed, but covered with light sand. In the center, the dark elf had stopped by a haphazard lean to structure, made of driftwood logs piled on stalagmites, and roofed in leather, fish skins and many, many more feathers of every size and color. Its home?

“Come see, come see!” It urged, crooking a hand at him. 

Loki went, adding a little more brightness to his mage light, steadfastly not feeling guilty when his erstwhile host whined and held its hand up to ward off the glare.

“I can’t see in the dark like you can,” he defended. 

“Oh, we knows, we knows that,” it nodded, thankfully keeping its own distance for now.

“See our pretties?” it waved to pile of random ‘treasures’, jumbled in no order that Loki could see. More feathers, of course, and scraps of fur seemed to make up the largest portions, mixed with crystals of different minerals, mollusk shells, and iridescent insect wings. An especially large pair of these caught Loki’s eye, and leaning in closer, he was horrified to see they were still attached to a desiccated little body that was not insectile at all. He bent closer to be certain, but could not bring himself to touch the fairy corpse.

“How did you get this?” he asked the hovering Dokkalfar, trying not to sound accusing.

“Poor little pretty. We would have fed it, yes, yes we would have taken good care of it, but it flew up and up and the crawlies gots it. Poor little pretty.”

Loki made a face, all too clearly picturing the fairy’s gruesome fate. “But how did it get here? It couldn’t have swum in.”

“We brought it with us. Brought it back to replace our pretty after they stole her.” Now the ugly little dark elf’s mouth twisted down. “We should have broken the wings, we suppose, so it could not fly up and get caught. So sad.”

“You brought it from Alfheim?” 

“From the bright world, yes,” it nodded vigorously. “We caught it sleeping and put it in a jar to keep the water out.”

“Oh… Do you go to the bright world often?”

“We did, pretty,” it sighed, crouching and shuffling closer to gaze on the little body. “But theys puts up wards now and we can’t goes through.”

“Who put up wards?”

“The pretties,” it cried in exasperation, bouncing on its haunches. “The wicked pretties, oh so hateful pretties, keeping all their pretty to themselves. Selfish pretties.”

“Why-“ Loki stopped and crouched down himself, taking a deep breath. The creature was mad, but it might be able to show him the way out. It would definitely be able to show him how to get back to Alfheim, if he could just coax sense out of it. 

“My name is Loki,” he offered. “What’s yours?”

The dark elf (he decided to think of it as such till he learned otherwise) regarded him with… confusion? “Our names?”

Elves did not like to give their true names, Loki remembered. “Or whatever you are called,” he corrected.

“Called? Who would calls us?” It laughed, low and ugly. “We would nots goes if they did calls us. No, no, no. We would nots.”

“Well,” Loki tried, “What should I call you?”

Another head tilt. “You can calls us Glom, my pretty.”

Loki didn’t much like the new possessive there, but he let it go. “Glom, then,” he repeated, noting to himself that the All-Speak interpreted the name as a verb also, meaning ‘to steal’. “I’m Loki. Can you show me the way to the surface, maybe?”

“We could,” Glom pursed thin lips, then shook its head, causing its knotted dark hair to fly and his earrings to tinkle again. “But we don’t wants it to go so soon.” 

It crept closer. Loki’s skin crawled, but he kept still and allowed it to lay a long, webbed hand on his knee. It stroked his coat, then reached up to touch his hair, and it was all he could do to keep still. Glom smelled faintly of fish, and its tunic rucked up far enough for Loki to ascertain that it was very much a he. “Such a pretty pretty,” Glom murmured, letting go and backing up as Loki eased his dagger a few inches out of the sheath. 

“No harm, no harm, pretty pretty,” he cried shrilly. 

“No harm,” Loki repeated, putting it back but not letting go. “Look, if you’ll answer my questions, I’ll give you a present.”

Glom perked up with a childlike anticipation. “What present?” 

Could it be a child? Or was it just small? How long had it been living alone down here? 

Loki summoned his pack and started digging through its contents, keeping one eye on Glom, who was watching eagerly. He hadn’t brought any trinkets, and most of the food was back with the luggage. What did he have that might tempt a solitary, mad Dokkalfar? 

He drew out a jar of honey and unscrewed the lid, offering it. “It’s sweet, see?” He dipped a finger and tasted it, then offered it again.

Glom imitated him, and scrunched up his ugly little face. “We don’t likes it.” 

He thrust it back at Loki, who took it and put it back in his back, though he wasn’t sure he wanted to eat it after Glom had put a finger in it. Who knew where that finger had been? He rummaged some more, considering a firestarter and deciding against it. He found a small, hinged utility knife and offered that, little though he liked giving this Glom anything that could be used as a weapon.

“Sharp,” the dark elf exclaimed exuberantly, after cutting his finger while testing the blade. He popped the bleeding digit in his mouth and sucked. After a minute, he checked it; the bleeding had stopped, and he grinned. “For us?”

“If you will answer some questions,” Loki reminded him.

“One present, one question,” Glom offered, eying Loki’s pack hopefully.

“More than one! That is a very good knife,” Loki protested Glom’s greed. How good could it be at bargaining, living alone in a dark cave? “Ten.” He splayed the fingers of both hands.

Glom’s bulging eyes narrowed thoughtfully and he held up one hand, offering, “Two.”

Well, ugly and short he might be, but Glom didn’t appear to be any less canny than his taller, prettier kin. Loki sighed and tried, “Eight.”

“Three.”

“At least seven,” Loki groused, not especially hopeful. “It’s a very good knife. Dwarven steel. Holds an edge for a very long time. It’ll cut through…” What was there to cut in this place anyway? “Though fish, or wood,” he nodded at the branches making up the lean to. “Cuts easy.”

“We has sharp rocks for fishes,” Glom informed him, turning the knife over in his hands. “And we don’t needs to cut wood. Wood is not good to eats, and doesn’t hurts us. Three questions.”

Then, he pointed to one of Loki’s daggers. “That one, seven.”

“Not these,” he protested. This pair was a gift from Sif. He summoned one of his throwing knives instead. It wasn’t as long as the dagger, but it was longer and deadlier looking than the folding knife. “This one. Ten.”

“Five,” Glom sniffed. “That and this.” He clutched the smaller knife close with one hand and held the other out for the throwing knife. Greedy creature. 

Well, Loki supposed he could afford to lose these, but not for five questions. “Eight questions,” he said. “Final offer.”

“Done,” Glom nodded, all but snatching the second knife to examine. “Pretty. Pretty from a pretty. Oh, we likes it.”

“I’m glad,” Loki held in a grin. “Okay, first question. Is this Svartalfheim?”

“The Dark World, yes,” Glom nodded once, not looking up from his knives. 

By the Norns, a straight answer at last. Loki breathed a sigh of relief. “All right, you said you know the way to the surface? Can you take me there?”

“Yes, we knows the way,” Glom replied. “We can show you.” He put down the knives and counted on his skinny fingers. “Five more questions.”

Loki groaned at his own stupidity for asking a question that he already knew the answer to. Five more questions wasn’t going to be enough, he thought. Maybe Glom would bargain for another knife? Or he could maybe see if the dark elf had any use for shiny buckles or buttons? Or a jar of healing salve?

He asked his next question. “Is the way out hard to find?”

“Not if you knows it,” Glom told him smugly. “But easy to get lost it is. Lots of tunnels. Lots of passages that don’t go any places. Four more questions.”

What to ask? Maybe it would help if he knew Glom a little better? He tried, “Why do you live here by yourself? Will the other dark elves not let you live with them?”

“Thems,” Glom growled. “We hates thems. They makes us sneaks and spies for them, and they steals our pretty pretty. They breaks our pretty pretty. We saw her after, all bloody and made not pretty. They had no right. She was ours, we found her first.”

“Your pretty, was she one of the light elves?” Loki guessed. 

“We found her and we bound her,” Glom chanted. “We caught her and we brought her, with us to our cave, to stay and save.” 

Coming back from this reverie, he grimaced fiercely. “One question left.”

“Two,” Loki protested, counting back over them. “And you didn’t really answer the last two!” 

“We did answer! We did so!”

“You live here alone because you hate the others? That’s not a different question,” he hurried to add. “I want to get the answer to the last two clearly.”

“Because we hates thems, yes,” Glom agreed resentfully. “They uses us when we are of use, but they hates us back, because we are not pretty like them. Why should we let them use us when we hates them and they hates us, and they took our pretty pretty. They takes everything they wants, always.”

That did sound like the Dokkalfar, all right. “All right. So you caught a light elf, like the fairy,” he nodded at the little body, “and you brought her here, but the other Dokkalfar took her away from you and killed her?”

“Last question?” Glom said.

“No, that is the same question you didn’t answer before, remember?”

“We didn’t put her in a jar. We used a bag. A big bag made of fish skin that doesn’t let the water in. But then she cried and didn’t hide, and so she died.”

Loki decided that was probably as clear an answer as he was going to get. The mention of hiding was a new cause for worry, though. “Do the others come here often?”

“Last question?” Glom sulkily asked.

“Yes, alright,” Loki gave in. “That’s my last question of eight. Do the others come here, and if so, how often?”

“That’s two. But we will tell you, because you are pretty and we like pretty pretties,” Glom smiled at him, possibly intending to look friendly, though the sharp teeth made it threatening. “They don’t come, not since the wards. They never went sneaking, only sent Glom, and after they stole our pretty, we hid, hid, we saw what they did, and they couldn’t find us, to beat us or bind us. Then they couldn’t go through, there was nothing to do, so they went away, and Glom got to stay, all alone till today.”

These wards Glom spoke of were a worry. Was he going to be able to go back at all? Did they only prevent the dark elves from going through the rift, or did they stop anything coming through from Svartalfheim? He’d better try to find out, and soon. If he couldn’t get through, he needed to find his way to… should he try for the next portal, or call for Heimdall to send the Bifrost for him? He really did not want to get caught on this realm when his permission to use magic ran out. Or anywhere, really. He had little doubt that the other dark elves would do as bad to him as they had to some unfortunate Ljosalfar that Glom had kidnapped, however long ago.

“Thank you for your help,” Loki stood up, a trifle unsteadily as his legs had gone to sleep from crouching too long. “What can I give you that would make you show me the way back to the rift?”

“Not yet, not yet,” Glom clutched at him. “You just came, just came, and we are so lonesome, so lonesome all alone with just the fishes.”

“If you’ll show me the way back to Alfheim, I’ll come back with others,” Loki promised recklessly. “They are waiting for me to bring them.”

“Other pretties?” 

“Yes.” He didn’t tell Glom that the others would not be staying to keep him company either. In truth, he was probably going to have to talk Thor and some of the others out of killing the creature.

“Look,” he offered, “I’ll bring you something back with me if you’ll tell me what you’d like. Food? Something besides fish? Some cloth? Warm blankets?” 

There was one in his pack, but he didn’t think offering it now was a good idea. 

“You could bring me a new pretty pretty. Taller than the small one, smaller than the tall ones? We likes you, yes, but something softer, with a sheath for our knife,” Glom leered, putting a hand on Loki’s groin, from which he swiftly backed away.

Glom cackled. “A soft little pretty. We would takes good care of her, yes, we promises. We won’t let them finds her again.”

Loki hesitated, repulsed by the idea of giving this mad elf any living thing to care for, much less a sentient one. Nonetheless, he did feel sorry for Glom, who his own kind saw only as a tool, and an ugly one at that. 

“Maybe you could go back with us, later?” he offered, wondering why he was so reluctant to simply lie to the awful creature.

This caused Glom to loose patience with him. “We told yous, the way is warded.”

“Well, I have to try to go, whether you help me or not.”

Woeful, the Dokkalfar clutched clammily at him. Loki batted his grasp away as gently as he could manage, not wanting to provoke an attack. 

“Just stays a little longer, pretty. We can shows you the ways tomorrow. We can show you the ways up, and the ways down, we promises.” 

Turning, Glom ducked into his ramshackle shelter and after some fumbling, came out with a wide mouthed earthenware jar, already opened. 

“We’s has forgot our mannerses, yes pretty. We should have given you a drink, yes. Are you thirsty, pretty? We has something nice we stole from thems. Very nice. You drink with us.”

“I’m sorry, I really can’t stay,” Loki said, wondering if the jar were the same one used to imprison the fairy. 

“You musts! Musts! It’s mannerses!” He tossed aside some piled skins and came up with a bowl sized shell which he filled, spilling the liquid in his haste, and thrust toward Loki’s face.

It was some kind of potent liquor, by the scent of it, with bits of leaf? herbs? floating in it. 

“Um. No thank you,” Loki warded it off. No way was he drinking anything this crazed dark elf offered him; not when it so obviously would do anything in its power to prevent him from leaving. 

“The pretty should drinks it,” Glom wheedled. “We helps it after it drinks it, yes.”

“I have to go,” he said, as firmly as he could.

The hand not holding the sloshing cup now held the throwing dagger Loki had bargained away. “No, no, no, it mustn’t goes yet!”

He could draw his own knife, but there seemed no point. He wasn’t interested in a fight, and he didn’t think even threatening to kill the elf would elicit the directions he needed. Instead, Loki simply went invisible.

Glom blinked, looking around wildly as he let the cup's contents spill away, and slashed the air with the knife. “No, no, no! It can’t leaves us. We wants it. We wants the pretty pretty!”

Easily evading the dagger, Loki vanished his clothes and other gear, and made his way back the way he had come, slipping into the water as quietly as possible.

Not quietly enough, though. Glom pelted after him, dropping the cup but not the knife and scanning the water with huge eyes, easily homing in on the ripples Loki could not help but make. He charged into the water, and began swimming, alarmingly quick. 

Loki called up his breath bubble and ducked under the surface. Then he faced a dilemma- he couldn’t see anything except the dim glow of the predatory worms high above without making a light, but if he made a light, Glom would see it and come after him. 

The dark elf splashed and churned the water, and several times wailed piteously, calling for him to come back. Instead, Loki dove deeper, feeling along the bottom for the entrance to the portal tunnel. The gem dangled from its chain, and Loki squinted at it, trying to make out the flash and follow it through the murk. 

Something moved near him and he froze, covering the gem. He could just make out the outline of Glom, swimming along the bottom, seeming intent on a destination rather than searching. Cautiously, Loki went after him, surreptitiously checking his wayfarer’s stone. It looked as if the dark elf either thought Loki knew the way out after all, or meant to lie in wait there.

Then Glom was gone, disappeared into the depths. Loki crept along the bottom, unable to see a thing and afraid of running into him unexpectedly. He had his protection charms, but Glom had one of his own knives, spelled to cut through enchantments as well as more material targets. In retrospect, Loki thought he should have bargained with something a little less lethal.

Worse almost if Glom did not kill him, but merely injured him badly enough trap him here, with his magic bound. He would be nearly as helpless as a fairy with broken wings. 

The current stirred nearby. Loki circled away, trying to determine if the crevice was wide enough to slip by Glom. He checked the stone again. It was doing that odd doubling of facets again. Now one, now two, then one again as he turned it incrementally. His hand brushed something soft and he drew it back. A plant? Or a feathered tunic? His breathing inside the bubble was too loud and he fought to quiet it, uncertain if it carried through the water as well.

Long arms were suddenly wrapping around him, fingers tangled in his hair, and Glom was dragging him up towards the surface. The blade of the knife pressed against his throat. He scrabbled at the hand holding the knife, feeling it bite as he pushed it away and Glom pushed back. The Dokkalfar was surprisingly strong for his small stature, and Loki could not dislodge him, though he managed to hold the knife at bay by using both hands. 

Thinking desperately, Loki called up magic, then tried to think how best to use it. He couldn’t use fire underwater. Ice, maybe? He shifted to his Jotun form and made his hands burning cold. Glom gave a gurgling cry but would not let go. Loki didn’t want to kill the poor creature if he could help it… What could he try? If only it weren’t so Hel-damned dark… Ah. 

With a sudden wrench and kick, Loki called up a flash of brilliant light. It was blinding and disorienting to him; to eyes used to this black pit… Glom released him, shrieking, his hands automatically reaching to shield his sensitive eyes. 

Freed, Loki plunged back down, blindly swimming into the crevice, his hands outstretched to find his way. He kicked with all his might, wanting to be gone before the blinded elf recovered. 

Then water changed to mist, and the darkness changed to star-strewn night, and Loki was falling, falling, with no ground in sight. Frantic, he twisted around, trying to get his bearings, and saw high above him a familiar rainbow bridge, growing ever smaller as he fell further and further down, into the Void between. 

Panicked, he called up the skywalking spell and flung himself at the bridge, almost forgetting in his haste to add the very important cushioning and slowing aspects till the final moment. 

He landed hard, sprawled practically at the feet of Asgard’s all-seeing Heimdall and lay there, too winded to move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> You may have noticed a distinct similarity between Glom and a Tolkien character. Tolkien was a big fan of the same Scandinavian and Anglo Saxon myths that also inspired Marvel to create the Thor comics. So if there were a Tolkien writing in the Marvel Universe, maybe his invented character turned out to be based on myth that were in turn based on a kernel of truth. Anyhow, it is in loving homage, not a blatant ripoff.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more, sorry for being so slow in updating. I am super grateful to any readers who are sticking with me and reading along. You guys have the patience of Job! And as always, a million thanks to my super beta reader and occasional co-author, tilla123.
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> ~~~~~~~

Heimdall did not react as Loki tried to gather his scattered wits and slowly sat up, wincing in pain. The water on his skin had frozen in hundreds of sleet-like pellets that dropped off him and plinked on the glassy surface of the Bifrost, and his disarranged hair crackled as he combed out chunks of ice. These were louder as they struck and shattered, pieces spinning away in all directions, but still the Guardian gave no sign of having noticed. Well, Loki thought a bit hysterically, no one had ever said that Heimdall was all-hearing, after all.

He didn’t think anything was broken, but he was probably going to be black and… oh yes, he was already blue, still in his Jotun form, which was fortunate. He hurriedly changed back to Vanir before remembering he was still under a spell of invisibility, among other concealments, and promptly started to shiver uncontrollably. He summoned his clothes, and a warm cloak, pulling it tight around him and adding a heat spell.

As he waited for his teeth to stop chattering, he tried to decide what to do. He had to get back to Thor and the others as quickly as possible. Otherwise they might try to come after him and end up drowned, or caught by Dokkalfar, or plunging into the abyss of the Void. Loki peered over the Bifrost’s edge into that endless fall between the realms and shuddered. Presumably the portal he had come through was down there someplace, a hole in space leading back to Glom’s cave, but he wasn’t about to try to go that way. That only left the Bifrost.

Rubbing the last of the melted frost from his face, Loki slowly got to his feet, trying to think of what he was going to say when he became visible.

While he was still trying to decide, Heimdall, still without turning to face him, spoke in that flat way of his. “Loki.”

So much for being unseen. Loki released his mage crafting and cleared his throat. “I suppose you must be wondering what I’m doing here.”

“No,” Heimdall replied.

“Um.” Was that a ‘No, Loki, I am not the least bit curious as to how you ended up on my bridge’, or a ‘No, Loki, I know exactly how you came to be here when you are supposed to be on Alfheim’? He couldn’t quite work up the nerve to ask.

“The absence of a thing is often as easy to see as that thing’s presence,” Heimdall informed him.

That sort of made sense, though he’d never really thought Heimdall was especially paying attention to him. Nor was it the important issue at the moment.

“Can you see Thor and the others?” Loki asked, worriedly. He didn’t think he had been gone that long, really, but Thor was so impatient sometimes, and Amora… who knew what she might put him up to?

“Yes.”

“Uh.. Are you sure?” He did not want to confess to his simulacrums, especially if they were working. He crept closer to where Heimdall stood, gazing out into what looked to him like the infinite universe.  
“What are they doing?”

“They are standing beside the Laughing river, discussing whether or not to to go in looking for you,” the watcher of all worlds replied.

“And they are establishing a hunting camp in the forrest nearby,” he added, in a flat, affectless tone.

So much for that. At least Loki knew Amora had not been right either about their being hidden.

“I guess I should explain,” Loki offered.

“You need not.” Now Heimdall did look at him. Sort of. The Guardian’s gold eyes were turned upon him, but they seemed to look right through him.

When he did not say anything else, and time stretched onwards, without either of them speaking, or Einherjar coming to drag him off to face Odin’s wrath, or worse, Frigga’s disappointment, Loki gave in to exasperation. “I don’t understand!”

“My duty is to warn against danger to Asgard,” Heimdall intoned.

“You mean you aren’t going to… You aren’t going to to tell anyone what we are doing? That Thor did not exactly tell the Queen the truth about where we were going?”

“As long as it does not endanger Asgard, no.”

“But, but-“ Loki gaped. “You.. I… Wouldn’t the All-Father wish to know?” I must be an idiot, Loki thought. Why am I trying to argue myself into trouble?

“The king no doubt would wish to know many things. That is the nature of kings. But my duty is to guard Asgard.”

“But Thor is the heir to the throne. Would it not harm Asgard if he gets ki-“ Loki superstitiously bit off the word ‘killed’. “In trouble?”

“It may,” Heimdall answered, seeming utterly unconcerned. “It may not.”

“How do you know the difference?” Loki demanded.

“I simply know.”

Delving a bit more into this mystery, Loki queried, “So you know of our true mission?”

“To retrieve the Serpent Crown? Yes.”

“And you knew it when you let us go to Alfheim?”

“It is not my place to question those who travel the Bifrost to a sanctioned destination, so long as they are not specifically forbidden.”

“So I could ask to go to Vanaheim anytime I want?”

“I have not been informed that you are forbidden to,” Heimdall answered.

“But not to Midgard? Or… Jotunheim?” Loki held his breath. Did Heimdall know for sure that Loki had already been there, if only briefly and by accident? How much did his absence reveal?

The Bridge Keeper’s reply was enigmatic. “Not by the Bifrost.”

Questions rattled around Loki’s brain like dice in a cup, tumbling and spinning. He wanted to know more about what Heimdall could see, and what constituted a danger to Asgard. He wanted to ask about the Crown, and Atlantis, and what Amora was scheming.

“You might wish to get back to the Prince,” Heimdall suggested, laconically. “He is now suggesting that they go in after you. Thus far, his friends have been able to dissuade him.”

So there was no time for questions. Loki wasted no time getting to the travel platform. “Send me back.”

Without comment, Heimdall unsheathed his sword and inserted into the control column.

“Can you get me closer to them?” Loki requested. “But far enough away not to be seen?” He was unsure why he didn’t want them to find out about this accidental jaunt back to Asgard. Maybe Heimdall’s secrecy was infectious.

“Very well.”

The Observatory began to turn, and the bridge’s colors began to brighten and change as the energies gathered and the spells activated.

A question popped up to the forefront of Loki’s brain. “If we get into trouble on Midgard-“

But Heimdall, along with the Observatory, the bridge and the whole of Asgard was smearing away in streams of light, and he was falling, flying, then falling again, landing lightly in a field of flowers.

Taking the form of a swift-winged falcon, Loki was soon circling high above Thor and the others, still on the river’s shore. Thor and Sif had both removed their armor and boots, but their clothes and hair were yet dry.

Flying around a bend in the river, behind a copse of willows, Loki plunged down to land on a sand bar, dropped the compass chain, then resumed his otter form, snatched it up in his teeth and swam as fast as he was able back to the others.

He arrived just as Thor and Sif were wading cautiously into the river.

“There he is!” Sif exclaimed with obvious relief when his furry head broached the surface.

Thor seemed pleased as well, but all he said was,“Finally!”

They both splashed back to shore after him, and the whole party gathered around as he shifted back to his usual form and flopped down on the grass to catch his breath. He slipped the chain back over his head before pushing wet hair back from his face.

Sif arrived by his side first, peering down in worry. “What happened?”

Amora eyed him with suspicion. “Why were you gone so long?”

Thor leaned forward. “Did you find the way?”

“I found it, yes,” Loki answered. “It’s a passage under the river, and it leads to Svartalfheim.”

“It looks as if you encountered Dokkalfar,” Hogun stated, his eyes fixed intently somewhat below Loki’s face.

“What?” Loki stared at him.

“You’re bleeding,” Sif cried, dropping to her knees and reaching out to turn his chin up so she could see.

Loki reached up to touch his throat, suddenly recalled to a stinging pain there, and his fingers came away stained with blood.

“Oh. It’s nothing,” he assured them, casting a by now very familiar healing spell. The pain eased, and he cooperated as Sif wiped the leftover blood away with a cloth wet with spirits.

“It didn’t look like nothing,” Sif rebuked him.

“Knife wound,” Hogun agreed.

At last Thor seemed to take notice. He crouched down next to Loki and put a hand on his shoulder. “What happened? Did the dark elves attack you?”

Loki hesitated, licking his lips. “Not exactly.”

“You attacked them?” Fandral suggested, arching a gilded brow.

“No!” Loki protested.

Vostagg’s idea was even more outlandish. “You put a knife to your own throat and held yourself hostage to make your escape?”

Amora cast the rotund warrior a scornful look, but Thor roared with laughter.

Loki had to smile. “No, my friend,” he denied, “But I will have to keep that tactic in mind for some future crisis when I need to convince an enemy that I am insane.”

Thor laughed even harder and clapped Loki on the back. “Come, Loki, do not be shy. Tell us how you came to be wounded. We were ready to come in after you, but you have rescued yourself just in time.”

“It was just one dark elf. A somewhat small one,” he told them.

“He tried to take you prisoner?” Fandral guessed.

Loki shrugged. “In a sense.”

“That seems rather a yes or no question to me,” Fandral pointed out, looking perplexed.

“He just didn’t want me to leave,” Loki explained. “He lives alone in the cave where the portal comes out, and I think he’s somewhat mad.”

“You said he was small,” Thor scratched the fuzz on his chin that he was trying to grow into a beard. “Why did you not just kill him?”

“Small is not always weak,” Hogun offered, sagaciously.

“Kill him?” Loki stared at Thor, shocked at the idea. “Why would I do that?”

“The dark elves are our enemies,” Thor shrugged, oblivious to Loki’s growing outrage. “Why wouldn’t you kill one?”

“Of course,” Amora batted her lashes at Thor. “You are so wise, Prince Thor.” Thor looked surprised, as if he had forgotten she was there, but he granted her the same charming smile he offered serving girls. She smiled back as if offered her heart’s desire.

Loki frowned, watching this interplay. Fandral sighed enviously.

“He attacked you,” Sif pointed out, more reasonably. “Did you not defend yourself?”

“He wasn’t trying to hurt me,” Loki protested. “And it was just a scratch.”

“We will deal with him soon enough,” Thor said, standing up and pulling Loki to his feet as well. “Are you well enough to lead us through?”

“Or give someone else the compass?” Amora suggested yet again. “So you can concentrate on your spell casting?”

Loki, who had been trying to marshal a reasoned argument for why they were not either going to go to proscribed realm, invade someone’s home and then kill them, no matter how insane and possibly dangerous they might be, glared at Amora instead. “I am perfectly capable of doing both.”

“Excellent,” Thor approved. “Let us be going.”

“Fine,” Loki surrendered, inwardly vowing he would figure out some way to keep Thor and Glom apart. But first, he would need to make sure they all got through the twisting passages without falling through the other portal and out into the vacuum of space. “We’re going to need some rope.”

 

~~~~~~

 

All of Loki’s fears came to naught, and the biggest problem they had was in getting Volstagg’s bulk through some of the underwater tunnel’s narrow bends. When they arrived in Glom’s cavern, there was no sign of the creature. Thor grumbled some about cowardly Dokkalfar as they looked for him in vain, and kicked the pitiful hovel down, scattering the piled ‘treasures’.

“This place is disgusting,” Amora complained, picking her way daintily to Thor’s side. Unlike the rest of them, she was dry, and her long blond hair was perfect. Loki had to admit that was a highly useful bit of magic.

“Well, we aren’t staying,” Loki retorted. “Provided you hurry up and tell us where to look for the next portal.” He had been trying to locate any sign of Glom with his seidr, but all he could sense was a shadowy presence. The back of his neck prickled with unease.

“I will need a few moments in private,” she declared, producing a scrying bowl and a flask and fussily trying to clear a place to sit where she would not get dirty. With a gallant flourish, Fandral whipped off his cloak and spread it for her. She flashed him a smile of approval and sat, pouring a silvery stream of water into her shallow basin.

Loki wanted very much to watch, but she looked up pointedly, waiting for them all to leave. They all retreated to the edges of Glom’s island, which was as far as they could go without swimming. Loki continued to try to find any sign of Glom, but the cavern was large and dark, and the little elf likely knew every nook and cranny. Also it was not impossible that Glom had some magic; most elves, dark and light had some. He might be nearby, hiding under a spell of concealment, just as Loki could. Probably Heimdall could see him, Loki thought with a sigh. He wondered how the guardian did it.

“I’m ready to lead us to the next portal,” Amora called out.

“Excellent!” Thor enthused.  
Loki barely stopped himself from rolling his eyes. Looking over at Sif, he saw she hadn’t had as much restraint. They exchanged less than happy smiles over the situation they were in, but they both fell in behind their Prince as he allowed Amora to lead the way.

As Loki had suspected, the route was not easy, or direct. It required them to scale up slippery rock faces, and squeeze and slither through narrow passages. As a precaution, Loki marked their way with spelled chalk, so they could retrace their steps if need be. Amora scoffed, claiming she could find their way back as easily as forward, but Sif and the others agreed it was a wise safeguard. Except for Thor, who merely shrugged and urged them all to hurry onwards.

In one of the larger caverns, a vast horde of bats clung to the ceiling, chittering and fluttering. The floor was a carpet of crawling cockroaches, feeding on an unknown depth of bat guano. Here and there giant centipedes gorged on the roaches. The air was foul beyond imagining, and though the protection spells Loki had made protected them from harm, it still felt as if they were choking on their shallow breaths.

Amora, Sif and Volstagg all united in abhorrence, refusing to attempt the crossing till Loki froze both guano and roaches solid, after which they all crunched through to the next side tunnel. It was narrow, crooked, and mostly free of bats and their leavings.

“Someone follows,” Hogun warned softly, from his place in the back of the party.

They all stopped, straining their ears, and after a moment Loki made out the soft, spaced out footsteps of someone attempting to walk stealthily over a mass of icy roach carapaces.

“Do you think it’s that Dokkalfar creature you met?” Sif hissed to Loki.

“I’ve no idea,” he whispered back. He suspected it was; it had been too much to hope that the mad, lonely dark elf would not follow them.

“Good,” Thor grunted, not bothering to lower his voice as he unslung his war hammer and started back the way they had come. “I had not liked the idea of leaving the little sneak at our backs.”

They all trailed after him, Loki hurrying to try and get ahead of him without being too obvious about it. He didn’t know what to do, but he did not plan to let Thor just murder Glom for no reason. Emerging back into the bat cave, Loki flung out a globe of light, but there was nothing to be seen.

“Where is it?” Thor demanded, peering around.

“It’s an elf,” Sif reminded them before Loki could. “Likely it has some magic to hide from our eyes.”

Brandishing his hammer, Thor started back out onto the disgusting ice. “No magic is proof against true warriors of Asgard.”

“Wait,” Loki called, coming to a decision. “Thor, hold!”

Pausing, Thor turned to regard him from under a furrowed brow. “For what?”

Loki unfroze the muck, beginning just beyond Thor’s boots, causing him to roar in surprise and scramble backwards.

Out from the middle of the guano pond, and thin shriek rose up and up, and there was a ghastly squelching and thrashing. The noise alarmed the bat populace, and a great cloud of them took flight, swirling around the cavern in a confusion and filling the dimness above with the sound of wings.

“Come on,” Loki grabbed Thor’s arm and yanked. “We can find the portal and be gone before he can get out and catch up.”

Thor frowned, but Amora forcefully agreed. “The sooner we are gone from this horrible place, the better!”

Shrugging, Thor let himself be chivvied back onto their mission, and they resumed following Amora’s near run. As the narrowing walls closed around them, the wail behind them coalesced into words that chased them into the dark.

“Pretties don’t leave! Come back! Come back, my pretties please!”

Abandoning any idea of stealth, Loki brightened the light spell around them and they ran through what seemed miles of tunnels as best as the uneven ground and various obstacles allowed. As far as they could tell, either by sound or smell, no one followed.

 

~~~~~~

 

The portal led to a remote mountain top in Nidavellir, where they rested for a an hour. Amora was complaining of aching feet, and Volstagg wanted lunch. Loki’s magic was growing strained by the constant use, and he was grateful to sit still and let it rest a while, once they had determined no one was in the vicinity. The dwarves were not enemies of Asgard, but they were jealous of their sovereignty, and it would undoubtedly cause a huge diplomatic incident if they were caught here.

Loki was almost hoping they would be caught. Not by the dwarves, but by Odin. He was no longer keeping up the spells of concealment, since Heimdall could detect them anyway. And in truth, he had never known the extent of what Odin could see from high Hlidskjalf. Thor would probably see it as a betrayal, he knew, but Amora’s secrecy, and the dangers of their method of travel were making him very uneasy.

The delay only made Thor restless. When he was not pacing around, he was staring resentfully at his battle hammer, despite it being a finely made weapon that had never yet failed him, so far as Loki had seen. It had worked well enough on the skulls of rock trolls, and bilgesnipe, and was plenty adequate for fighting the kinds of threats Thor routinely faced, especially since Thor also had Loki, and his other companions to aid him.

Once Amora had recovered her composure and performed a healing spell on her blistered feet, she went off behind a screen of bushes to do whatever it was she was doing to determine their path. She pointed them to the next mountain over, which was even steeper and stonier than the one on which they currently sat.

The wayfarer’s stone confirmed the direction, and Thor took off at a near charge down the mountain. Thankfully Sif was able to get him to take it more slowly before someone fell off a cliff.

The next hidden doorway between realms was in the deepest recesses a long-abandoned dragon’s lair, in a cave halfway up the steep slope. The stone floor was gouged all over from the beast’s claws, and there were yet a few scattered gold coins and links of platinum chain among the splintered bones of the monster’s meals. A faint sulfurous stink lingered even still, but by the signs, the dragon was long gone. Thor bemoaned its absence, but no one else agreed with him.

The next realm was Hel, where everything was drowned in a chill mist, and naught was visible save the gray, dead grass under their feet, and sometimes a twisted corpse of a tree, just before they would have walked into it. It was seemingly a dead world, but they all knew it was not empty, and the living were not welcome.

They probably were only wandering through that eerie landscape for a few hours, but it felt longer, and there was no day or night, or sky or shadow to keep track of the passage of time, and the fear none of them were willing to speak wore on their nerves to the point they were snappish and sullen in turns, when they spoke at all. Mostly they did not. It felt somehow wrong to intrude on the utter silence of that dead place.

Loki had returned to keeping them all invisible, and despite his brief rest, he was soon growing fatigued again from so much prolonged use of magic, but they did not wish to encounter any of the dead, nor any of Hela’s dread guardians. Still, it seemed an age before they found the next gateway, after missing it in the fog several times and having to circle back, in the hollow under the roots of an ancient and long dead grandfather oak.

The next one emerged on an airless, barren moon somewhere, and Loki had to use still more magic to to conjure breathable air, along with keeping up the spells protecting them all from the cold of space, and cosmic radiation. He had nothing left when they almost ran into a patrol of Skrulls guarding a mining base. With Sif’s permission, Amora took over keeping them invisible, and she proved quite adept at it, but the Skrulls were an advanced race, with more than their eyes to inform them of intruders on their domain. They set off alarms twice, and had to retreat into hiding as the warlike aliens swarmed around like angry wasps in search of intruders.

Eventually Sif was able to scout out a circuitous route around the sensors, allowing them to creep carefully onto the base. They avoided the domed living quarters and shuttle port, snuck past the heavily guarded blast cannons and found an extensive mining operation. Here they discovered the reason for the pervasive security. The Skrulls were mining for a rare and valuable element, vibranium, and their workforce, judging by their haggard and dispair-ridden faces, ragged clothing and haphazard safety gear, was not a voluntary one.

Thor was briefly moved by the slaves’ plight, and Sif and the others perked up at the idea of a possible rescue. It was just the sort of heroic quest they enjoyed. But in the end, the slaves were aliens, and Amora was adamant they should continue on, filling Thor’s mind with visions of glory, and the prized Serpent Crown with which to impress his father. It was hard in more ways than one to move unseen through the cramped space, ducking the miners and their overseers, to finally locate the portal at the end of a sealed off mine shaft. The heavy door bore a bright red sign, printed in three different languages, all proclaiming ‘DANGER!’ ‘DANGER!’ ‘DANGER!’

Since the Skrulls were notoriously fearless, Loki made sure they took all precautions before going through. He taught Amora his protection spells (which she should have already known) and made her cast them along with his, just to be on the safe side. She grumbled somewhat about Loki being overly careful, insinuating that he was afraid. Loki shrugged her sly insult off, guessing that his would-be rival was miffed at having her lack of skill being exposed in front of Thor and the others.

She changed her tune fast enough when the portal dropped them into a vast plain of slowly flowing lava in Musphelheim. A stony crust had formed over much of it, but it still oozed fiery orange in the cracks, and the cooling rocks crackled and hissed. The heat was terrible, baking their feet through their boot soles and smiting their bare faces. The air burned their lungs and was thick with choking fumes. Even with them both holding the protection spells, there was no way they could stay for more than a short time.

“Can you keep up our shields and still scry the way out?” Loki doubtfully asked Amora, as soon as he was certain they were not going to immediately perish.

She scowled at him as if she would blast him with magic, had she any to spare right then. “Maybe,” she said, after a too-long pause. She looked frightened, but also angry.

Taking Thor by the elbow, Loki tried to turn him around. “We should go back!”

“It is not that bad!” Thor tried to insist, though he broke out coughing at the end.

“I feel like I’m being roasted from the feet up!” Volstagg called, shifting hurriedly when he started sinking into the lava.

“Our fat friend is right,” Fandral chimed in, as cheerfully as he could manage while hopping from foot to foot, “We’re all going to be cooked here! We should either go back or lie down and roll so we’ll be baked on all sides evenly!”

“Come on, Thor!” Sif put a hand on the prince’s other arm and helped Loki move him. “We can come up with a plan back where we came from, and try again!”

“No, wait!” Amora launched herself at Loki, scrabbling at his throat, startling him so that he almost faltered in his spell work. Thankfully, long drilling with Thor and his friends had taught him better, and he held his part of the shields steady. Luckily so, because Amora’s had become thin and tremulous in her distraction.

He batted her clutching hands aside. “Stop that and hold the shield!”

“Check the compass!” she railed at him. “The next gate can’t be far! It has to be close by! We wouldn’t have been le- This is the shortest way! It has to be! And it has to be close enough for us to get to it safely!”

Thor pulled free of both Loki and Sif, looking freshly hopeful. “Check it, Loki! I do not wish to go back if we need not.”   
Loki stared at her, once again wondering how in Valhalla she was discerning their route. He was absolutely sure she was hiding something important from them, and he planned to get to the bottom of it, but not while his boots were scorching away under his feet.

He dragged the compass out of his tunic and checked. By the brilliance of the flare on the facets of the stone, Amora was correct, and the next portal was nearly as close as the one they’d just emerged from. It was beginning to seem like the portals might often occur near each other. Maybe the realms overlapped in spots? Or the fabric of the universe was worn thin in those areas?

Seeing the compass for themselves as he held it, Thor and Amora both looked triumphant. “See!” she crowed, as Thor shouted, “Onward, friends!” and started away toward the next portal at a jog.

No time to wonder about portal theory now. Loki dashed after Thor, as did the rest of them. “We should go back,” Loki pleaded in a low voice. “Amora and I are both getting tired. If the next realm is as dangerous as this one, we’ll be in serious trouble!”

“It probably won’t be,” Amora said, uneasily. “I mean, it shouldn’t be… We’re meant to get there, after all.”

Sif and Loki both looked sharply at the young enchantress. “Meant to?”

“Sif and I and the Warriors are some of Asgard’s finest warriors,” Thor exclaimed. “We’ll protect you.”

“Thor!” Loki moaned protestingly. “Not everything can be fought with swords and hammers. Look under your feet! Can you fight fire? What about a blizzard? What if the next world is Jotunheim?”

“But it’s right there!” Thor argued. “Can’t we just look, and see if it’s dangerous?”

“I will go first if you wish,” Amora taunted.

Loki glared at her for encouraging Thor in this… this folly, and trying to make him out the coward for trying to protect the prince.

“Pick a direction soon,” Hogun grunted.

“Fine,” Loki muttered. “Amora can go first.” He pulled out the skein of light rope and tied one end around her waist. “Just go through and come right back and tell us where it leads.”

“I need no woman to take risks for me!” Thor proclaimed, looking thunderous.

“Amora and I are the only ones who can shield,” Loki told him. “So it has to be one of us. And this was all her idea.”

Thor tried to take the rope off her, arguing, “This is my quest. I will go first.”

“No,” Loki wedged himself bodily between Thor and the troublemaking girl, re-checking his knots.

Thor grabbed Loki’s shoulder. “Then why don’t you go first?” he asked, angrily.

Loki wanted to yell, “Because I don’t trust her to be able to hold the shields long enough, and I don’t want to come back and find you all turned to charcoal!” But what was the use? Amora had Thor practically convinced that Loki was a craven.

Frustrated, with his feet screaming in pain from the heat, and his head swimming from the toxic gases lacing the air, Loki just growled, “She volunteered!” and shoved Amora hard in the direction of the portal.

She vanished, leaving only the rope Loki held extending into seeming thin air. Thor glared. Everyone else looked nervously between the two of them.

“Thor,” Sif tried to sound reasonable, “Loki is-“

Whatever she meant to say was cut off as Amora popped back out of the portal, panting, “It’s safe! It’s beautiful! Hurry up!”

No one argued, not even Loki, however much he might have wanted to under other circumstances. But he was the last to go, and since he had forgotten to let go of the rope, the others all but stampeded over her in their rush to go somewhere besides here.

The next realm was indeed quite beautiful, at least what they could see of it as they squeezed out of a narrow crevice at the bottom of a cannon. For a surreal moment, Loki thought they had reached their destination of Atlantis somehow, because high above them giant fish slowly glided against deep azure. But the plants and trees around them, while unfamiliar, were clearly terrestrial. Could it be that there was a dome or a forcefield over an underwater civilization? The scant information Loki had found on Atlantis had said it was inhabited by a water breathing race.

Then a formation of winged, armored women flew over, and Loki realized they were in no realm he had ever studied.

With his eyes still locked hopefully on the now empty sky, Fandral commented, “Thor, have I mentioned how much I enjoy following you around lately?”

“Indeed, friend,” Thor laughed, also gazing in the direction that the flying females had gone. “We should learn more of this place before we travel on!”

Sif groaned softly, rubbing her face. She looked tired, as were they all, possibly excepting Thor, who was indefatigable.

Amora looked peeved. “We surely mustn’t delay our mission, Prince Thor?” she wheedled.

“We could all use a bit of rest,” Thor countered. “And this world seems a paradise!”

Peering around at the lush but strange landscape, Amora reluctantly conceded, “I suppose we could rest here for a bit. Maybe beneath those trees?” She pointed a a small grove of flowering trees not too far away. It did look an inviting spot to sit.

“Nothing doing, my friends,” Thor announced, dragging Volstagg to his feet and heading out up the slope in the direction the winged patrol had headed. “We have come to a whole new world. We would be remiss if we did not introduce ourselves!”

“Thor,” Loki headed after him on bitterly complaining feet. His head felt muzzy, and his limbs seemed to have acquired lead weights. “We are intruders, Thor. We can’t assume they’ll be friendly. They were wearing armor, after all.”

“Not much armor,” Fandral leered cheerfully. Amora gave him a poisonous glare.

It was true the womens’ armor and clothing had been rather… revealing, but Loki guessed one wouldn’t want to wear anything heavy or encumbering to fly in.

“They carry large weapons as well,” Hogun pointed out.

“So do we,” Thor said, marching on. “It doesn’t mean we aren’t friendly.”

Weakly, Loki attempted, “I thought you were in a hurry to get to Midgard.”

Thor countered, “And you were right in saying we are all weary. We should stay the night in this place and be guested by these ladies.”

“There is a strange magic here,” Amora murmured, almost to herself. “Something powerful and oppressive.”

Loki looked over at her sharply, and opened himself to whatever it was she might be sensing. He was so tired he was staggering trying to keep up with Thor, and his magic felt more like an ember than his usual bright flame, but there was… something.

“I don’t think I like this place,” Loki assayed, as Fandral and Sif each put an arm around him from opposite sides to support him up the steep hill in Thor’s wake.

“Nor do I,” Amora agreed, using magic to annihilate an innocent thorn bush that happened to unfortunately be growing in her path, leaving only a pile of smoking twigs in its wake.

“What is the hurry?” Volstagg asked, bringing up the rear as usual.

Thor tossed a smile back at his fat friend. “The sooner we meet these winged warrior women, the sooner they can begin preparing a feast in our honor.”

“Let us not dawdle, then!” the Lion of Asgard roared, overtaking them all and leading the charge.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Loki told Sif. “We have no idea if these people are friendly.”

“We don’t know they aren’t,” Fandral said. “Anyhow, they aren’t likely to murder strangers on sight, right? I mean, nobody does that.”

All further debate was summarily cut off as another flying patrol, or maybe the same one, came into view overhead.

Thor waved his arms wildly, shouting, “Greetings, beauteous ones!”

If the women were startled, they did not in any way break formation, but zeroed in on them rapidly.

Loki blinked, but it took him a few seconds to figure out why he was surprised by this development.

“I thought you were keeping us veiled,” he hissed at Amora.

Indignantly, she retorted, “I thought you were!”

“Too late now,” Sif informed them, steadying Loki before releasing him so she could have her weapon at ready if it seemed to be needed.

The troop landed before them, gazing at them intently, but without overt hostility. “Strangers,” their leader stepped forward, picking out Thor as their own leader. “I took you at first for our anchorites, though they are seldom seen on the surface, but you aren’t.”

She put out a curious hand and ran it along Thor’s muscular bicep. “You are stronger.”

She swept her attention wider to them all as Fandral took a step forward and bowed with a flowery flourish. “We are most delighted to make your acquaintance, ladies.”

“Quicker,” the troop leader noted, as if to herself.

Fandral’s move had caused a few of the women to half-draw their weapons, which caused Sif and Hogun to do the same, but the leader quelled the escalation with a languid wave. “You are warriors,” she said, in a wondering tone.

“Indeed, but we come in peace,” Thor assured her. “We are traveling on a quest to elsewhere, but it has been a tiring journey, and would be grateful for your kind hospitality.”

“Perhaps we can assist you,” the leader mused, smiling.

“For a price,” one of her warriors added, matter-of-factly.

This addendum caused Sif’s hand to tighten on her glaive, but she made no move to draw it.

“Not as welcoming as I’d have liked,” sighed Fandral, who had a strict policy about what he did and did not pay for.

Loki tried to muster up something about how this was a strange place with new customs, and how they should tread lightly, but he was just too tired and slow-witted.

Another of the winged women spoke up, “Tell us, travelers from outside, who are you? From what realm do you hail?”

The All-Speak was translating for them all, as usual, but Loki noted that they asked about ‘what realm’, not ‘what world’, which implied they knew of other realms. Did they mean the Nine? Or were there other realms to which this one belonged?

“I am Thor, son of Odin, and prince of Asgard,” Thor announced proudly, “And these are my-“

“Asgardians!” shrieked the leader, launching herself back and up into the air, her troop swiftly imitating her.

“The nothing ones have invaded!” another cried, back winging and staring with wide eyes.

“Oh Hel damn it,” Sif groaned.

“They seem to know something about Asgard,” Loki noted, somehow not all that surprised that whatever it was they knew it wasn’t favorable.

Holding up his hands in an attempt at placating the women, Fandral smiled and called, “Ladies, ladies! I give you my word, we are not invading!”

They paid him no heed. Steel rang out as swords were yanked from scabbards, and sunlight glinted bright off a sudden flowering of sharp objects, all pointed at Thor and his friends.

“Crush their bones!” one of the flying amazons screamed. Another howled, “Grind them for prison bread!”

Well, that was just odd, Loki thought. Prison bread? To feed to what prisoners? Was there a grain shortage, or what? Then thought he must be really, really tired to be having such idiotic ideas when they were all about to be chopped to bits.

Sif’s glaive glittered as she held it at ready, and her eyes were hard, but out of the corner of her mouth she asked, “Do we have a plan, Thor?”

“I have no wish to injure women!” Thor informed the women. “If you will not show us hospitality, then let us pass through your realm unhindered!” He commanded, raising his hammer high. Coming up to flank him, Fandral, Hogun and Volstagg all brandished their weapons as well.

“That’s your plan?” Sif asked, sarcastically.

“Kill them all!” the patrol leader barked, and launched herself at them like a charging wyvern. The others followed, and there was no time to do else but fight for their lives.

The flying women were fierce and seemingly fearless, and almost as quick as the Aesir. They weren’t as strong, physically, but being able to fly was a distinct advantage. While those on the ground fought Thor and his companions with swords and spears, others circled overhead throwing down stones and small circular blades and caltrops. None of these did much damage against the Asgardians’ armor and the protection spells Loki was struggling to keep up, but they were distracting. Dodging a stone that was on course to crack his skull, Fandral was almost skewered. He leaped back, then jumped inside his attacker’s guard to strike her on the temple with the hilt of his sword. She fell senseless, but others surged forward in her place.

Thor, Hogun, Volstagg and Sif were likewise fighting to wound or knock out their foes, and the ground was becoming littered with unconscious or groaning women. It looked as if they might have a chance, but the leader called out, ordering two of those remaining to fly for reinforcements. Loki cast a sleep spell after them, but either he was too drained or they were out of range, because they only wavered briefly before continuing on, flying fast away to bring back the Norns knew what. Desperately, he considered shifting into an eagle, or a small dragon to go after them, but he didn’t want to leave the others.

“I really do not wish to hurt you!” Thor growled at the two women who were slashing and stabbing at him. With a well-calculated blow of his war hammer to the closest one’s breastplate, he sent her flying back. The second one he tripped, grabbing her spear with his free hand and breaking it over her head, denting her helm and putting her out of the fight.

Sif was concentrating on slashing at the women’s wings, having found that this was their weakness. The wings were large, and thin boned, and even feigning a blow at them was sufficient to cause the fighters to back hastily away.

Somewhere behind Loki, Amora was chanting something over and over. He took it for some spell at first, but after a moment he made out that it was an invocation of some kind. He risked turning to look at her.

“Set grant me your aid,” she intoned, arms crossed, palms pressed to her chest and eyes shut tight. “Set lend me your power. Set give me strength.”

“What are you doing?” Loki demanded. He thought he vaguely recognized the name of some ancient being, though no details would come to mind. Even so, invoking any being, even the smallest elemental, without careful preparations, wards and a summoning circle was incredibly dangerous.

“Set destroy my enemies!” Amora’s eyes flew open, burning with some eldritch power, and all around them, every single one of the winged females burst into flame and burned to ash, too quickly to even scream.

Loki stared, horrified, as did Hogun and Fandral. Thor spun around, bewildered and flustered. Volstagg made a retching noise, having gotten a face full of ash when his opponent went up in a puff of smoke while he was charging her.

Sif was livid as she turned on Loki and Amora, quickly ascertaining who was responsible.

“I revoke my permission for you to wield magic,” she snarled at Amora, who was looking both stunned and exultant at what she had done.

“You can’t do that!” Amora yelled back at Sif, raising her hand as if to fling a spell in retribution. Nothing happened. Letting out an angry snarl, Amora wrenched at her collar.

“Yes, she can,” Loki said, low and harsh. “And I think she had better not grant it again. What.. How could you-“ he cut himself off, shaking his head as he gazed around at the nearly two dozen piles of pitiful ash that had been women only a minute ago.

“We must go,” Hogun stated. “More will come.”

“We should go back,” Loki said. “This has gone far enough, Thor. We should go back and tell the All-Father what we found.”

“Go back now?” Thor was incredulous.

Amora said quickly, “The next realm is Midgard, Prince Thor. We are so close to our prize!”

“Just whose prize?” Loki queried sharply. “Who is this ‘Set’ you called on?”

Amora tossed her head, defiant. “One of the Elder Gods.”

“Are you insane?” Loki wanted to shake her. “Or possessed?”

“Neither,” she insisted. “Set wants his artifact in the hands of someone who can use it wisely, and safeguard it. He is guiding us to it for that reason.”

“You cannot possibly believe-“

“We can argue about this later,” Sif said, grabbing Loki’s arm and turning him to see tiny specks in the sky, far off but quickly getting closer.

Reaching deep into himself, Loki found his reserves and recast the veil to hide them. Hopefully they had not already been seen, but regardless they needed to get away from the remains of the flying patrol.

“Sif’s right,” Thor said, putting his hammer back on his belt. “We have to go.”

“Which direction?” Volstagg asked.

Thor looked directly at Loki. “The way back is long and dangerous. Midgard should be safe enough, if we can just get there.”

“That’s what we thought about this place!” Loki protested.

“Can you hide us a little longer, if that is all you have to do?” Thor asked. “Isn’t that easier than all the other protection you had to cast?”

Loki sighed tiredly, “Yes, but-“

“I can hide us, if you’ll give me back my magic,” Amora insisted.

“You can be quiet,” Sif told her, glaring daggers at the young enchantress. Amora returned the look.

Thor put an arm around Loki’s shoulders. “We will go on to Midgard, and once we are there, we will rest and talk this through,” he promised, sounding oh so reasonable. “All right?”

“All right,” Loki agreed, drawing out his compass to find their direction.

The portal they had come through was behind them, to the east. Another portal was somewhere to the north, conveniently in the opposite direction of the new, much larger contingent of flying warriors.

Thor smiled. “Let’s go.”

Once they had climbed out of the ravine, it was apparent that this place, like Asgard was small and artificial, rather than a planet. It was densely populated, crammed with a vast city with only a few places like their deep crack left unfilled. It seemed a strange oversight, but the architecture seemed to indicate that this winged race tended be more interested in building up, rather than down.

But in the end, down was the direction they ended up going. Loki normally would have been more curious, but as it was, just keeping their group hidden from the hordes of angry women searching for them was taking up what was left of his energy. It felt like ages since he’d slept.

Sif and Fandral took turns supporting him, as they followed the compass into a guarded doorway, then down many, many steps to an unguarded but more intricately decorated set of doors. Holding an illusion that the doors remained shut as they passed through them was chancy without knowing what the doors looked like inside, but as they crept through, no one seemed to take any notice.

They had come into a large chamber filled with sitting figures, all cloaked and hooded and cradling globes lit with candles. It was not easy to tell at first, but a few faces not as deeply concealed caught Loki’s attention, and after that he scanned the crowd more carefully and was almost certain that all the figures were male.

Unlike the women above, they were not muscular or strong looking, or winged. Loki wondered if they were even of the same race, or if these males were captives for breeding purposes. He decided not to mention this theory, lest Thor decide to try to free them, or Fandral decide to attempt to join them, at least temporarily.

All of them were facing the center of the room, where a large obelisk of shining crystal. The scene was eerily silent and still, and Loki had to add a sound muffling spell.

They first attempted to circle wide of the meditating figures, walking soft-footed along their perimeter, but on the far side, the compass revealed they had overshot the target, which was evidently in the middle of the room.

They made their way through the seated figures with as much care as they were able, but it did not seem possible to be completely unnoticed, seeing as how the men were sitting so close together. A few times they brushed or bumped a man, once nearly knocking one completely over, but though a few raised their heads to look around them, none raised any alarm. The few who seemed to notice anything amiss soon lowered their heads again, returning to their meditation with apparent resignation.

In the center of the great hall, Loki circled the huge crystal. It was three times his height, and two paces across on each of its five sides. The crystal was clear, but scintillated in waves of rainbow colors in manner that called to mind the material of the Bifrost. The wayfarer’s stone proclaimed it to be their portal, but it was solid to the touch on every face.

“Well?” Thor hissed in what he probably thought was a whisper. Loki winced, but no one seemed to have heard, or cared.

“I need to do some discernment spells,” Loki said, in a true whisper, running his hands along the smooth surface of the crystal.

“Get on with it then,” Thor urged.

“I can’t do that and hold our veiling,” Loki explained. Ordinarily he could have, but he was fast reaching his limits. He had been casting veils and obscurings, protections and shields and water-breathing spells, conjuring air and heat, and had sky walked and shape shifted multiple times today. There was only so much a sorcerer could manage.

They all turned to look at Amora, who had been alternating between sulking, insisting that she had been in the right to do what she’d done, and vociferous demands to have her magic restored.

She straightened under their dubious stares. “I can do whatever is needed,” she said. “Just give me my magic.”

Sif narrowed her eyes, considering. “You have my permission to do illusions. You can’t kill anyone with that.”

Amora huffed resentfully, but cast a competent enough veiling. Loki released his own and took a minute to gather his focus.

“I think the portal is here,” he told the others, “But it must be blocked off, like most of the ones on Asgard.”

“Can you unblock it?” Thor asked.

Loki licked dry lips, trying to ignore his weariness and jangled nerves. “Maybe.” The stone was slick as glass to the touch, but warm where he’d expected it to be cool. Only the faintest trace of magic could be detected, for all his probing. Did that mean the seal was incomplete?

Leaning closer, Loki searched, trying to feel where the magic seemed the strongest. At last he found it: a thin spot in the barrier. Now what?

“Are you sure they can’t see us?” Sif asked, in a low voice. Loki glanced up, following her gaze to where one of the seated figures was looking intently in their direction. Where all the others looked emotionless, this man looked almost desperately hopeful.

“No one can see us!” Amora swore, also turning to look.

“No one can see us,” Loki agreed, less certainly. “But another magician might be sensing something…”

“Loki,” Thor frowned. “Can you not hurry?”

“I am not certain I can do this at all, Thor, much less with you breathing down my neck!” Loki shot back.

“If you would let me call on Lord Set,” Amora began, before Sif, Hogun, Volstagg and Fandral all chorused a stern ‘NO!’ It ended up rather loud, and they all looked nervously around to be certain they hadn’t been overheard.

Thor turned his attention back to Loki. “Why not?”

It was all Loki could do not to tear at his hair. “Because whatever has sealed this gate, it is powerful magic, and I’ve never done anything like this, or even read about doing it!”

“If I had Mjolnir,” Thor opined, “I could just smash it open…”

“That is not how it-“ Loki stopped mid-rant, suddenly inspired by a wild idea.

“Loki?” Sif prompted, nudging him.

“Actually, smashing it might not be a terrible idea,” Loki admitted.

Thor brightened somewhat. “But I do not have Mjolnir.”

“You have a very good hammer, made by the dwarves, meant to channel your lightening powers,” Loki told him.

“Not nearly as well as Mjolnir would,” Thor responded, hoisting his unnamed weapon with a little more respect, despite his protest.

“It may be good enough to break through long enough to pass. Everyone gather in close and hold on to one another. If we can open this gate, I don’t think it will stay open long.”

It seemed probable that the gate they had come through to get here was just as sealed from this side, though there was no way to prove his theory without going back to find out. Loki was tired and wanted to sit down, possibly lie down, and just rest someplace safe for a bit. Surely Midgard, with it’s backwards people, relatively harmless beasts and tolerable climates in most regions, would be better than going back.

He formed a wedge of bright, pure magic, aiming it at the thinnest spot of the gate’s seal. “Hit it here,” he instructed Thor. “As hard as you can.”

Thor grinned widely and took a long step back. He drew the hammer high over his head and called on his innate powers of the storm. The hair on Loki’s arms and scalp prickled and lifted as electricity filled the air. Out in the crowd of seated, cowled figures, the too perceptive one stood up, letting his light globe fall unheeded.

There were no clouds so deep underground, but nonetheless, the thunder answered Thor’s call with a tremendous ‘KRA-KOOOOOM!!!’ As Loki poured every bit of magic he had into the wedge, Thor struck it with all his might.

There was a blinding flash of light, and some force - vacuum or gravity or the sealing spell’s attempt to close - pulled them all screaming in fear and triumph through the gate. As they tumbled into darkness, somewhere midair, there was a sudden force and friction at Loki’s throat. He only recognized that the compass was being ripped from him after the gold links had parted, and he had an instant’s glimpse of Amora’s hate-filled and victorious expression, before a mountain of green water rose up in front of him and slapped him senseless.

When he came to, Loki was alone in a wild sea, half drowned and so cold he could not feel his own hands or feet. He yelled for the others at the top of his lungs, but the howling wind around him ripped his word to shreds and tatters. If there was any reply, he could not hear it above the storm.

Shoving his hair out of his eyes, Loki tried to think around his mounting panic. Thor and the others could not have gone far, he just needed to search for them, and this form was wholly inadequate for the task. The marine mammal shape he had practiced for Midgard’s ocean would be much better. Loki shifted.

Or rather, he tried to shift, but nothing happened beyond his getting a lungful of water when his mouth fell open in shock at his inability to do such a simple magic, no matter how tired he was. He tried again. Nothing. He tried a more familiar shape, the magpie that was his favorite bird form. Again, nothing.

This can’t be happening, Loki thought. I could shapeshift as a newborn infant, according to my foster parents! Except when. Oh, bloody Hella and all her bloody hounds, they had been realm jumping so long that his sense of time had become utterly undone. Just how long had it been since Thor had renewed Loki’s permission to work magic?

“Thor!” he screamed into the wind. “Thor! Sif! Can anybody hear me?”

There was no reply except the wind blowing frozen spray in his face as the waves lifted him high, before dropping him into deep troughs, then falling on him like stone walls. In desperation, he even called out to Heimdall. Again, there was no answer. It was all he could manage to keep himself from drowning.

Then, as he was driven deep down beneath a wave, Loki encountered a ship the likes of which he had never seen, and would never have expected on Midgard. It was long and cylindrical, made of metal, and the sound of it was like hundreds of very unmusical drums, all played in unison. It was also traveling under the water, which was like nothing Loki had ever read or heard of, on any realm.

Holding his breath, he swam nearer to the strange craft, noticing the insignia of a many-armed sea creature painted on its helm. Was there any chance that Thor and the others had been seen and invited aboard? On the surface there was a second ship, more conventional but loud and large and more advanced than Loki would have dreamed, cut through the water. As it passed, what looked to be metal barrels fell into the water near the undersea boat. After watching them descend for a moment, Loki ignored this development, assuming that the violent storm swept some unsecured cargo off the overhead ship’s decks.

His lungs ached, but he could hold out a while longer, he was sure. He swam towards both vessels, hoping to be able to board one, and then ask whoever was commanding both if they had seen the others.

Without warning, the water around the undersea craft, and Loki, exploded with tremendous force. The blast lifted Loki, hurling him up and up, till he crashed face first into the steel plated side of the ship above. The world turned to white stars, then faded to black, as the waves swept up to take Loki into their cold and deadly embrace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~~~~~
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> Kudoes, questions and comments are delightfully welcome!


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Really sorry about the delay, folks. Work and RL have been busy, the weather has been hot and I've been stuck on details. Still not 100% happy with this, but this log jam needs busting so the story can flow on. I hope you like it. Comics fans may find some interesting details that I've cherry picked from different comic eras and storylines. Again, this is in no way cannon with anything, and I don't own Marvel, or these characters, and it's all just my little love letter to the fandom, not copyright infringement. 
> 
> Thanks as always to my patient and inspiring beta reader, tilla123, who has been so encouraging. 
> 
>  
> 
> ~~~~~~~

Incredulous, but with growing elation, Amora watched Loki being swept farther and farther away from her and the rest of their company, shrouded in her illusions so he could neither see or hear them, or be seen or heard, despite his shouts. Then she laughed out loud, getting a mouthful of cold seawater and nearly choking. She coughed and spat, careful to keep her spells going, then laughed again, to herself.

She hadn’t really expected her plan to work; she’d only meant to steal the portal finding compass for now. She had snatched it as they passed through the portal and secured it in a magically hidden pocket of her blouse while they were still falling, intending to deny any knowledge of what had happened to it. But when they’d landed in a cold wild sea, Loki had been farther away, and a swell had come between them, separating them further, and Amora had acted on impulse, cutting him off. His voice, audible now only to her, grew fainter and fainter, blended in with the howl of the wind, and then was drowned out completely by Sif and the rest yelling to each other, and then for Loki when they realized they could not locate him.

“Amora!” Sif swam closer, her stupid horse face white and wild-eyed as she fought the sea. She gasped, “Amora, can you use your magic to find Loki?”

“I only have permission to cast illusions!” Amora reminded the idiot bitch. “I need full access!” Though illusions had been sufficient to get rid of Loki, at least for now. Before he found them again, she intended to show her prince what she was capable of.

“I give you permission to use any magic!” Sif croaked. “Just don’t kill anybody else!”

Ignoring this last, Amora immediately gathered her released power and used it to propel herself closer to where Thor and Fandral each hung onto Volstagg’s arms, either helping the fat warrior stay afloat, or using his bulk as an impromptu buoy.

“Prince Thor, are you all right?” she demanded, searching his ruggedly handsome face for any sign of injury as her hands wove glyphs and charms for warmth and skintight shields to repel the freezing water on her beautiful prince, herself, and then the others. It was tempting to skip Sif, tempting to see if she could lose her as she had gotten rid of Loki, but she reluctantly refrained, just in case she needed her permission renewed again before they reached Atlantis and returned to Asgard with the crown that would make her Asgard’s next queen.

“Aye, I am well enough!” Thor told her, his eyes warming with approval as he recognized her magic working for his benefit. “Can you find Loki?”

Amora bit her lip, aiming for a fetching but distressed expression. “I can scry for him, but not here!”

“Is there nothing else you can do?” Sif more accused than asked. 

“Not while we’re in the middle of an ocean!” And not that she would if she could. This was going to be her time to shine.

“You did this on purpose!” Sif spat out a tendril of wet hair, glaring. “You and this idiotic quest you’ve lured Thor out on!”

“I did nothing, except to try and aid my prince!” Amora retorted. She was tempted to drown the woman… Perhaps later.

“Now, now,” Fandral smiled fatuously. “This hardly seems the best time to argue about who may have lured who where…”

An especially large swell lifted them up sickeningly high, spinning them and tossing them like so much flotsam. They clung tightly to each other, all argument on hold as they fought to keep hold of one another against the forces of tide and gravity. When they had flowed down again to a less alarming height, Hogun managed to use their rope to tie them all together with loops around their waists. Still they hung on to one another’s arms; their makeshift harnesses cinched cruelly tight if they lost their grip, but at least they were no longer in danger of losing any more of the group.

“Maybe we should call Heimdall!” Fandral proposed, but Volstagg noted, “The storm seems to be passing. I think we’ll be all right.”

Thankfully, the wind soon eased from a gale to a friendlier breeze, and the waves also grew smaller and less frenetic. As their situation grew less fraught, they began to try and work out what to do next. Much to Amora’s dismay, Sif and the rest of Thor’s shiftless friends wanted to leave off their quest and return to Asgard.

“We have to be close to Atlantis now!” Amora protested. “It could be right beneath us!”

“Fandral’s right,” Sif said. “We should call Heimdall and go back, and find out how to get to Loki. He could be in trouble!”

Voice going shrill, Amora demanded, “You want to just give up now? After all we’ve been through?”

“This is nothing,” Fandral mentioned, grinning like an idiot. “You should have been with us on Nornheim. That was much worse.”

At his side, a soaked and grimmer than usual Hogun grunted, ‘Too soon to say that.”

“You’re always so encouraging,” Fandral told him.

Grasping the prince’s cloak in both hands, Sif pulled herself practically on top of him. Amora ground her teeth. 

“Call Heimdall!” Sif yelled, trying unsuccessfully to shake Thor and dunking them all under the next wave. 

“You can’t treat Prince Thor like that, you stupid whore!” Amora tried to drag her off her beloved by her ugly black hair. 

Sif yelped, let go of Thor and turned. Then there was a sudden explosion of pain, and Amora’s head rocked backwards from Sif’s punch.

“Uh-oh,” Volstagg said, unhappily.

Thor weakly tried to interject, “Sif, maybe you shouldn’t…”

Amora erupted with a scream of rage, summoning magic to blast the bitch.

Sif began, “I revoke your perm-“ 

“Stop this!” Thor thrust himself between them and glaring at each of them in turn. “This is unseemly and solves nothing!”

“You’re right,” Sif conceded, though she continued to look murderously at Amora.

For her part, Amora inwardly vowed she would pay Sif back tenfold, someday soon, but she put on a contrite expression and simpered,“Forgive me, my prince.”

“Good,” Thor approved. His face was grave as he scanned the seemingly endless water all around them. “Sif speaks true. We must abandon this quest and find Loki.”

“Oh, thank Odin,” Volstagg muttered, as Sif heaved a sigh of relief.

“No!” Amora cried in frustration. She was so close, and if she failed now she would never get another opportunity. Frigid, uptight Frigga would make sure she was sent away to serve some dried up old stick of a bureaucrat and she would never get to marry her prince and help him make Asgard wonderful!

Thor tilted back his head and shouted up at the sky, which was just starting to show patches of pale blue between scattering clouds. “Heimdall!” he called, his voice ringing like a hero in a skald’s tale. “Heimdall, open the Bifrost!”

‘No,’ Amora chanted inwardly to Set, to the Norns, or any power who would aid her. ‘No, no, no!’

They waited anxiously, slowly riding up and down on the currents. A large bird appeared, and Amora’s breath caught in apprehension, but it was a gull, not a raven. The Bifrost did not open.

“Can the Bifrost even open over water?” Fandral asked nervously.

Instead of answering, Thor yelled again for the Guardian to open the Bifrost, becoming louder with each repetition.

“Wait, wait,” Sif managed to get Thor’s attention and stop him from calling a sixth time, then turned accusingly to Amora. “Are you still doing whatever it was that keeps Heimdall from seeing us?”

“No!” Amora snapped. Not that she wouldn’t have if she were able, but she still despised Sif for accusing her of it in front of Thor.

“Um, are you certain?” Volstagg inquired idiotically. “Maybe you forgot to turn it off?”

“But wouldn’t he have seen us when Sif revoked her permission back wherever the Hel that was?” Fandral asked, looking confused.

“But she has permission now,” Sif replied, hateful as usual.

“Loki was hiding us,” Hogun pointed out.

“It’s not me!” Amora angrily splashed water in Sif’s face instead of slapping her as she wanted to. “I wasn’t doing it in the first place. It was Set!”

Volstagg blinked stupidly. “Who?” 

Sif wiped her face and glowered, but asked, too calmly, “Set is this entity who told you about the Serpent Crown?”

They were all staring at her as if she had done something wrong, and Amora wanted to kill them all for it. All but her beloved Thor, of course, and it was breaking her heart that he was looking at her like that. She was doing this for him after all! 

“Yes, he told me about the Crown!” she snarled, kicking harder so as to come up higher out of the water. “So? He wants his artifact to be in a better place than with a bunch of fish people! A safer place,” she added, as they all went on looking at her accusingly.

“Get him to stop hiding us,” Hogun said, inflectionless as always.

Amora gaped at the man. “What?”

Sif took up the demand, “Tell your Set to stop hiding us from Heimdall!”

“Amora, I must agree,” Thor said, reaching out to grasp her shoulder.

“I can’t contact him without my scrying mirror!” Amora protested weakly. 

“You weren’t using a mirror when you called on him to burn those women,” Sif reminded them. 

Amora bared her teeth and hissed, “They were trying to kill us!”

“That was no reason to-“

Thor smiled, and said boisterously, “If you could call on him without the mirror for that, surely you can call on him to stop whatever it is he’s doing to hide us!”

Dragging her bedraggled hair from her face, Amora spared a moment to hate Sif for that too. If she’d had her magic when they came through the portal, she could have kept dry. “I could try. I don’t know if it will work.”

“Try, then,” Thor urged.

“Maybe that’s not a good idea,” Sif said, suddenly changing her mind. “Loki seemed to think calling on this Set was dangerous.”

“Loki is a fool!” Amora proclaimed. “Set was helping us! He led us here, and he can help us get the Crown, I am sure of it!”

“We aren’t going to get the wretched crown,” Sif growled. “We are going to rescue Loki!”

“We might be in need of some rescuing ourselves, just now,” Volstagg suggested. This silenced them all for a moment, as they all looked around at their circumstances. In the middle of a Midgardian ocean, with no land in sight.

“Try to contact your Set,” Thor ordered. “Tell him to cease hiding us from Heimdall’s sight.”

Amora confessed. “He never said Heimdall wouldn’t be able to see us, just that we wouldn’t have to worry about it.”

Sif’s eyes bugged out, making her even more unattractive. “Then what is he doing?”

“I don’t know!” she yelled back. “He’s an ancient deity! How should I know what he can do!”

“Then how could you get us involved in this? This Set could be evil! He could be leading us into a trap!” Sif screamed at her.

“That isn’t what happened!” Amora retorted. “It isn’t like that!”

“Doesn’t matter,” Hogun said loudly. He had begun to tire, and had to keep swimming harder to keep from sinking. He was wearing the most armor, and his head dipped beneath the waves between kicks, but he didn’t seem concerned about it. Of course he was rather simpleminded, from what Amora had seen.

“I rather think it might matter if there’s an evil entity involved,” Fandral said mildly. 

“Hogun is right,” Thor nodded. “Amora, call on your Set and ask him to undo what he has done.”

“We don’t even know that is why Heimdall hasn’t sent the Bifrost,” Amora protested. “Maybe it won’t work on the ocean!”

“Then we will come up with another plan,” Thor said, reasonably.

“Anyone have any ideas?” Fandral asked, sotto voce.

“Amora, please try?” Thor pleaded with her. 

Her heart melted a little, and she smiled tremulously at her beloved. “Anything for you, my prince,” she vowed. It was true, she was doing all of this for his benefit. He would thank her for it when he was the greatest king in Asgard’s history, ruling over all the realms with her by his side.

Behind Thor, Sif rolled her eyes. It made her look even stupider. Amora spared her a withering stare before composing herself as best she could and focusing on calling on Set. She had no intention of going back to Asgard without the Serpent Crown, so she worded her request very carefully.

“Set, grant me your favor. Set, hear my plea. Let us be seen by those who can aid us!” But not by Heimdall or Odin or Loki, she prayed silently as she repeated the chant several times.

Thor and the others shouted for Heimdall to open the Bifrost, and it continued not to appear.

“I guess it didn’t work,” Fandral stated the obvious.

Flouting her wardenship over Amora, Sif ordered, “Try again.”

“Wait,” Thor had turned his attention away from the clearing sky and now was peering intently at something behind Amora. “There’s something strange over there, sticking up from the water.”

They all turned to see what resembled a large, round eye on a long stalk, seemingly looking back at them.”

“Wonderful,” Volstagg grunted. “A sea monster.”

Suddenly, the eye sank out of sight.

“Maybe it was scared off by the sight of us?” Fandral said, without much hope.

Thor was gripping his hammer tightly, searching for any sign of attack. They all unshipped their weapons, but it was going to be difficult to use them with them being so closely tied together. Amora gathered magic and prepared a spell that might work to drive the beast off. She’d only ever tried it on dogs before, to keep the nasty curs from shedding on her gown.

Then the ocean began to boil. Something huge was rising from the depths. Amora squealed with mingled outrage and terror. Sif set her jaw and aimed her javelin. Thor and the warriors three raised their weapons, preparing to fight, but what surfaced at last in a mighty rain of spray was no monster, but a metal machine.

“What in Odin’s name is that?” Volstagg demanded, looking affronted for some reason.

Amora gasped in surprise, her faith in Set restored. It was a ship! A ship that sailed under the waves!

A round door on top of the wondrous craft swung open with a clang, and a man climbed out. He was dressed all in black, trimmed with sliver, and he bore a red armband depicting a skull with the tentacles of a sea creature. The same sigil was painted on the side of the vessel.

As two more men emerged carrying strange weapons, their leader leaned over a railing and looked them over curiously.

In a jovial but somewhat mocking tone, he called, “Hello! You look like you are in need of some assistance!”

 

~~~~~~

 

Dozens of sailors stretched down their hands to help Steve up as he clambered back over the railing to the deck of the USS Renshaw. They caught at his is hands and his soaked jacket, dragging him aboard and divesting him of the limp form of the stranger who’d been caught in the blast of the depth charges. Then he was hustled along behind the man to the ship’s med bay and bundled into a blanket. 

He was itching with curiosity about the man who’d been exploded into the side of the ship by the depth charges they’d been using to try and flush an enemy submarine. His fleeting impressions had been of a pale face, dark hair and a long leather coat that had weighed the man down, but not much else.

“How is he?” Steve asked, trying to get a better look without getting in the way of the Chief Hospital Corpsman and his assistant.

“Alive.” The HMC, affectionately called ‘Doc’ Greene by the crew though he wasn’t actually a doctor, looked up to scowl at Steve. “Go get out of those wet clothes and get a cup of something hot from the galley. I don’t need Captain America getting the gripe on my watch.”

“I’m fine,” Steve assured him, although he was starting to feel the chill now that the adrenaline was wearing off. He didn’t seem to get sick since the serum- he’d been on enough winter missions in the Alps to learn that, but it didn’t keep him from feeling the bite of the cold.

The assistant was working a pair of scissors on the leather coat without effect. “Doc, I can’t cut this stuff!” 

Doc reached for a bigger pair of shears, but they didn’t so much as scratch the material. He tossed them down with a clatter and growled, “Help me get the coat off, at least. And whatever these things on his arms are. Never seen anything like it.”

Neither had Steve. The Nazis and Hydra both had a fondness for black leather and long coats like this, but the gold accents were new He was no expert, but they looked to him like real gold. There was no insignia of any kind, except… 

He leaned closer, peering at the shining metal band around the man’s neck. It bore a series of letters, but not in English, or anything he recognized. The face above it was bruised and battered, with a swelling contusion above one eye, and a trickle of blood running down from the hairline. It didn’t look too bad, but Steve knew that looks could be deceiving. God knew he’d seen soldiers survive after looking like ground meat, and others dead without a visible wound on them. 

“Is that Russian, maybe?” he asked, drawing Doc’s attention to the metal collar, and to his self still there against doctor’s orders.

Doc ignored the former, preferring to focus on the latter. “Didn’t you hear me tell you to go get dry and warm up?”

“Look, Doc,” the assistant yelped, “This guy’s carrying knives.”

“Well, get rid of them!” Doc snapped, continuing to try and examine the man while his helper wrestled with the soaked, clinging coat.

“If he’s Hydra, he might have a poison cap on him too,” Steve told them. “Possibly a false tooth. You’ll want to be really careful.”

“For real?” the assistant boggled. He’d gotten the heavy coat off and tossed it aside. Underneath, the stranger wore black leather trousers and a bright green padded tunic heavily embossed with gold plating. Again there were no emblems of rank or anything else. There were two sheathed daggers on a belt, but not the pistol Steve would have expected. Very odd.

Doc looked thoughtful. “Go ask the supply officer if we’ve got some handcuffs or something,” he told his assistant. The ensign nodded and scurried off.

They all flinched as more explosions sounded from outside. After a moment they relaxed. More depth charges. They weren’t being fired on.

“We can handle this, Captain Rogers,” Doc reiterated, waving him away. “Go on. Get dry.”

“You heard the doc,” the XO’s voice rang out behind Steve. “Go get changed.”

“Any sign of the sub?” Steve inquired, stalling.

Lt. Commander Davis shook his head. “Nothing except this guy since we lost sonar contact. Could be we sank her.”

“Sir,” Steve pressed, “It can’t be a coincidence, Namor not meeting us at the rendezvous and these guys lurking around.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Davis said, turning to get his first look at their maybe prisoner. “Can you bring him around? We could use some answers.”

“I’ve just barely started my exam,” the HMC’s voice was barely suppressed irritation. “I’ll give you my report as soon as I know something, but it will go faster if people will let us do our job.” His look at the second in command was respectful, but Steve got a double dose of ‘annoyed’.

“I’ll go get changed,” he sighed, surrendering. The sooner he did that the sooner he could come back. 

Davis followed him out of the med bay. “Good job getting him out of the water,” he praised.

Steve shrugged. “Glad I could help.” 

He truly was. He had been feeling incredibly frustrated this whole voyage, without anything to do, and even more so when Namor hadn’t met them after sending an urgent request for Steve’s help. It hadn’t said with what, but the Sub-Mariner had disappeared a few weeks back in response from news of strange things occurring in his undersea realm.

Steve wasn’t sure he entirely trusted the Atlantean prince after the stunt he’d pulled kidnapping the president, and the man’s arrogance got under his skin, but he’d been a very useful ally, and in Steve’s book he was owed any help he asked for. The U.S. Navy was less enthusiastic, and the ship’s captain, Commander Leyland, had been especially disgruntled about being pulled out of the fleet and sent to courier Steve to this meeting.

Steve could hardly fault the man; he’d felt much the same way when he’d been yanked out of hunt for Hydra and assigned to work with (and keep an eye on) Namor and the Human Torch. Sgt. Fury ran the Commandos now, and Steve sometimes ached with how much he missed them. And Bucky. That loss was still as raw as ever, and Steve woke up at least once a week from a dream of his friend falling and himself helpless to stop it.

“So is that guy Hydra, you think?” Davis asked, shaking Steve out of his useless thoughts.

“No idea. He’s not in any uniform I’ve ever seen.” Steve used the blanket to scrub at his hair and step aside to let a pair of seamen go by, intent on their tasks. All around them men worked to reload depth charges and scan the sea for any sign of the enemy. 

Davis’s gaze swept around busily. As the second in command, he had at least as much to do with running the ship as the captain, and clearly he needed to get back to it.

“We’ll find out who he is when he wakes up, I guess,” Steve suggested, trying for optimism. Hopefully the fellow would recover, but he’d taken a hell of a hit, and ‘Doc’ wasn’t a surgeon. If there were internal injuries, they were a long way from help.

“Right,” Davis agreed. “I won’t keep you, then. But thanks again for diving in like that. I don’t know if anyone else could have gotten to him before he drowned.” He adjusted his cap, eyeing Steve speculatively. “Wish the Navy had a few guys like you. Ever thought about switching from Super Soldier to Super Sailor?”

Steve felt a blush creeping up his neck. He never knew how to handle all the praise he got. He gestured at the busy crew around them. “Don’t think you guys really need me,” he grinned.

Davis laughed. “Well, I just thought I’d mention it. Well, duty calls!” He hurried off to his job, and Steve went to his tiny cabin to change into some dry clothes.

As it turned out, the only clean outfit he had left was his Captain America uniform. Steve hadn’t wanted to wear it on board; it seemed too boastful when he wasn’t the one doing any of the fighting, but at least it was warm. He put his jacket on over it, and after a moment’s consideration, hung his shield on its accustomed place across his back.

The cook gave him a cup of salty chicken noodle soup and some stale saltines. Steve mashed his crackers into crumbs and mixed them into the soup, then ate the warm, thickened results as quickly as he could spoon it up. His enthusiasm earned him some canned peaches in syrup for dessert, and he thanked the cook effusively, and at the man’s request, signed a well worn ‘Captain America’ comic book for the man to send home to his kid brother.

Calm had returned to the ship while he ate. No new explosions rocked the boat, and the announcement to stand down from battle stations came just as Steve bussed his dishes. 

“I guess we lost them,” the cook commented disgustedly, after thanking Steve. “Damned Nazis gave us the slip.”

“Maybe not,” Steve offered, smiling, and headed back towards the med bay and hopefully some answers.

He arrived just in time to hear a loud crash and shouting, so he was not surprised when the black and green clad figure burst through the door, pelting towards him at high speed.


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

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> You guys had probably given up on this story, seeing as how I haven't posted in forever! But it's not abandoned. Here's a little bit more as my holiday gift to you! 
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As more black-clad mortals climbed out onto the metal deck of the submersible ship, Thor and his friends swam closer, eager to get out of the sea. Amora's magic was protecting them all from the cold, and from sinking, but it would be much more preferable to be on solid ground, or a firm surface anyhow. The men lowered a rope net to aid them in getting onboard. Thor and Sif were the first to reach it and began climbing eagerly.

As they reached the deck, several of the mortals pointed their weapons. Sif went instantly into a defensive stance, and behind them, Fandral called out in alarm, but Thor was unconcerned. He strode confidently towards the man who seemed to be in command.

"Greetings! We are mightily glad for your coming!" Thor announced.

"No doubt," the leader of the mortals quirked a sardonic smile. "And we are glad to have you as our guests. At least, we will be, once you and your friends surrender your weapons."

Immediately, Thor's face clouded. "That seems a poor manner in which to treat guests," he said, suspiciously. "In truth, it sounds more as if you mean to take us prisoner."

"You are more perceptive than you appear," the commander replied. "It is your choice, give your weapons to my men and come aboard, or go back into the sea."

Hogun and Fandral had now both gained the ship's deck, while Volstagg was still struggling up the straining net. Two mortals leaned down and pulled Amora up. They both grinned eagerly at her, as others did at Sif.

"You dare threaten the son of Odin?" Thor growled, brandishing his hammer as the air around him began to crackle threateningly.

"What?" Amora tried to rush to Thor's side but was grabbed around the waist by one of the sailors. She promptly felled him with a blast of green fire, and he tumbled headlong into the ocean, shrieking in pain. 

The Midgardians fired their weapons. The noise was tremendous, and pellets of hot metal flew from them. The first few bounced harmlessly off Fandral's armor or were deflected by his whirling blade as he stepped gallantly in front of Amora, and then the fight was indeed engaged.

Thor laughed at the thrill of battle as he used his hammer to sweep three of the attacking mortals off their boat. Sif and Hogun teamed up to herd a dozen others together, ripping their weapons from them and throwing them into the water. Volstagg did not bother to use his axe but just barreled into his opponents, ramming through them if they were too slow to jump into the sea themselves to escape his charge.

Within moments, Thor and his friends were alone on the metal deck, and their enemies were all struggling to get back onboard. Other mortals who had been about to emerge from the hatch now retreated below, slamming it shut behind them. 

Raising his hammer high, Thor aimed to smash it open and give chase. The enemy's commander started towards him, screaming, "No!" but was stunned to his knees by the flat of Fandral's sword. Sif thrust her glaive into the path of Thor's hammer just in time to mostly block the blow, though the entire vessel rang like a gong, shuddering under their feet.

"Thor!" Sif ignored Thor's glare of displeasure at being thwarted. "Take care not to break this boat! I am not eager to end up in the ocean once more!"

"Indeed, friend," Fandral agreed, flushed and grinning from the fight, "Let's not sink our new raft just because it has a few vermin on it."

"Vermin indeed," Amora echoed angrily, using magic to drag the previously arrogant leader up from the metal ladder he was climbing. The man flailed and kicked as he floated over to be dropped ignominiously at Thor's feet. "They obviously need a reminder of how to behave towards their betters."

Picking the mortal up by his collar, Thor hoisted him up so they were face to face. "I believe it is you who will be our prisoners."

The commander clawed at Thor's wrists as his face darkened. "Never!" he gasped furiously. "We will never surrender! Cut off one head, and two more will take its place!"

"Truly?" Fandral swung his blade threateningly. "If I cut off your head you'll grow back two? I would very much like to see that."

The man glared hatefully at them. Thor shook him lightly, saying "You have little choice. We have defeated you."

When the man tried to answer, nothing emerged but a raspy croak. Sif prodded Thor lightly. "Put him down so he can breathe."

Thor did as she asked, and the mortal staggered as his feet touched down, but kept his feet. He was no coward; Thor would give him that much. The rest of the crew was creeping back on board, shivering and glowering, but none of the few who still retained their weapons attempted to fire them.

"Captain?" one of them called. "What are your orders?"

After coughing and taking a deep breath, the commander spoke resolutely, "You may have beaten us, but my men will destroy this vessel before surrendering!"

"You little worm," Amora hissed. "Mind how you speak to the prince of Asgard!"

"I thought we were trying for a low profile?" Volstagg commented as he wrung water from his beard.

Thor ignored them both, studying the bedraggled mortal who dared defy him and tried to think out the problem. "We do not want your swimming boat. Only guest rights, and to be conveyed to land. We will repay you."

"No," Sif interjected urgently. "We need to find Loki!"

"True," Thor agreed, reminded. He hoped his mage was all right. Loki was usually so resourceful, and Thor had expected that he would have found them by now.

The captain was looking at each of them in turn, his puzzlement growing on his face. "Just who are you people? You are not Americans?" 

"Nay," Thor shook his head. "We are visitors to your realm, and we require your help in locating our companion."

"Visitors?" The captain frowned, then looked past them at his cold, wet men. He was shivering himself, and pale with the cold, though he determinedly showed no weakness.

"If you are not our enemies, stand down so I can see to my crew."

"Prince Thor is your rightful ruler," Amora insisted. "You can see to the others as soon as you agree to do as you are told."

"I have no idea who you even are! I have not ever heard of a ‘Prince Thor!" 

"So forgetful, these mortals," Fandral sighed. "Leave them alone for a few centuries and they don't even recognize you."

"Thor is the heir to the throne of Asgard," Amora managed to sneer at the mortal while cozying up to Thor, smiling ingratiatingly. "Soon to be the ruler of all the realms!"

"Protector of the Nine Realms," Sif said dryly. "There is a slight difference."

"Asgard… Home of the gods?" the mortal goggled at them. "I do not believe-" He trailed off as Amora's hands began to glow with magic, and electricity sparked off Thor's armor. "I would be willing to hear your story," he amended. "As guests… Honored guests, of course!"

"We accept!" Thor proclaimed, clapping the captain on the back. "Let us go into your craft and share bread and drink!"

"An excellent notion!" approved Volstagg. "I haven't feasted on Midgardian fare in ages."

Gesturing for his men to follow, the captain led them to the shaft that led down into the metal boat, saying, "We do not have provisions for feasts, but we will see what we can do. And maybe you can do something for us as well."

 

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End file.
